Study shows people ‘right size’ portions of high-calorie foods

New research reveals that humans reduce the size of energy-rich diets, suggesting that people are eating smarter than previously thought.

A study led by the University of Bristol revisits the long-standing belief that humans are insensitive to the energy content of the foods they consume and therefore tend to eat the same amount of food (weight) regardless of whether it is energy or not. Do-abundant or lack of energy.

Research published today American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, This is especially important because it disagrees with the common view among researchers that people tend to overdose high-energy foods.

This idea comes from previous research that manipulated the energy content of foods and diets to create low-energy and high-energy versions. In these studies, people were not informed whether they were eating a low-energy version or a high-energy version, and findings tended to eat the same weight diet, with the high-energy version having higher calorie intake. Showed that there are many.

“For years, we believed that humans unknowingly overeat energy-rich diets. Surprisingly, this study allows humans to adjust their consumption of high-energy density options. It shows some nutritional intelligence as much as possible, “said lead author Dr. Anika Flynn. She is a nutrition and behavioral researcher at the University of Bristol.

In this study, instead of artificially manipulating the calories of a single food, a regular daily diet with different energy densities, such as a chicken salad sandwich with figroll biscuits or porridge with blueberries and almonds. I examined the data of the test used. The study enrolled 20 healthy adults who temporarily lived in the ward, where they were offered a variety of meals over a four-week period.

A team of international researchers, including the National Institutes of Health (NIH) diet and metabolism guru, have found that every participant consumes calories, grams, and energy density (per gram). Calories) was calculated. The results showed that dietary caloric intake increased with the energy density of a low-energy diet, as was also seen in previous observations with artificially engineered foods. Surprisingly, however, a turning point was observed in which as energy density increased, people began to respond to increased calories by reducing the size of the food they consumed. This suggests a previously unrecognized sensitivity to the energy content of the diet people were eating.

Because this finding was based on data from small, highly controlled trials, researchers investigated whether this pattern remained when participants lived freely and chose their diet. .. Using data from the UK National Diet and Nutrition Survey, researchers have again found that energy-deficient diets increase dietary caloric intake with energy density and decrease energy-rich diets. Importantly, for this turning point pattern to occur, participants had to eat less of the more energetic meals by weight.

“For example, people ate a little more energy-rich creamy cheese pasta dishes than salads with a lot of different vegetables that were relatively low in energy,” said Anika.

This study sheds new light on the apparent subtle sensitivities of human dietary behavior, especially the calories of energy-rich diets.

Co-author Jeff Branstrom, a professor of experimental psychology, said:

“This work is particularly exciting because it reveals the hidden complexity of how humans interact with modern energy-rich foods, which we call” nutritional intelligence. ” I’m out. The reasons why foods and the like are associated with obesity are more subtle than previously thought. At least for now, this provides a new perspective on long-standing problems and opens the door to a variety of important new questions and paths for future research. “”