Why You Should Eat Breakfast and the Best Times for the Rest of the Day’s Meals

Keeping track of what you’re supposed to eat to stay healthy can already be overwhelming, but it turns out that when you eat what can also be important for keeping your weight in control and for warding off chronic disease.

It turns out Mom was right: you should eat breakfast. And if you don’t believe Mom, a growing body of studies shows that a good meal in the morning can help your body prepare for the day to come, and lower your risk of heart disease, diabetes and obesity. But what about the rest of the day’s meals? Here’s what nutrition experts say about the best times to eat and why.

Morning
Don’t skip breakfast. Reporting in the American Heart Association journal Circulation, Harvard School of Public Health researchers studied the health outcomes of 26,902 male health professionals ages 45 to 82 over a 16-year period. They discovered that the men who skipped breakfast had a 27% higher risk of heart attack or death from heart disease than those who honored the morning meal. According to the scientists, skipping breakfast may make you hungrier and more likely to eat larger meals, which leads to a surge in blood sugar. Such spikes can pave the way for diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol levels, all risk factors that can snowball into a heart attack.

Pass on the pastry. Eating in the morning — and what you eat — is important for setting your blood-sugar pattern for the rest of the day. “If you eat something that is whole grain and has some fat and protein to it, your blood sugar is going to rise slowly and go down slowly. If you eat something refined, like an overly sweet cinnamon roll, that’s the worst thing you can eat,” says Judy Caplan, a registered dietitian nutritionist for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. “You get an insulin [spike], and [then] your blood sugar drops too low so you get hungry again. That’s why people get into a cycle of overeating junk.”

To ease your body into a more consistent blood-sugar pattern, try some oatmeal, whole-wheat toast with almond butter, or an omelette with spinach and avocado. Caplan’s favorite breakfast is a baked sweet potato with a little bit of cinnamon and a small bit of butter. Who says you have to eat just cereal in the morning?

Afternoon
Fuel up at the right time. In the 1960s, nutritionist Adelle Davis popularized the mantra “Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and dinner like a pauper.” Why? Fueling up makes sense earlier in the day, when your body needs the most calories for energy. That’s why in many European countries, the largest meal of the day occurs in the afternoon. “Ideally, you want to give yourself fuel before you do harder labor,” says Caplan.

If you’re used to eating a smaller meal for lunch and a larger meal later, you can still fill up with a hearty meal that has significantly fewer calories. “A fairly large meal [that] is full of salad and vegetables [is] big in volume but light in calories,” says Caplan.

Evening
Don’t overdo it. Calories get burned up no matter when you eat them, so theoretically it’s O.K. to eat after dark. But if you eat a heavy dinner, you’re not as likely to get rid of those calories before you turn in. “What you don’t burn off is more likely to be stored as fat, as you become less active toward the end of the day,” says Tracy Lockwood, a registered dietitian at F-Factor Nutrition. “Eating too close to bedtime increases your blood sugar and insulin, which causes you to have a hard time falling asleep. Therefore, your last meal should be the lightest of the day and should be eaten at least three hours before you go to sleep.”

There’s another reason that late-night eating, after dinner, isn’t a good idea. In most cases, those visits to the fridge involve sweet treats such as ice cream and other desserts that can send blood sugar soaring right before bed. That can lower levels of the hormone melatonin, which is supposed to help you feel tired and relaxed, so waning levels can make it harder to fall asleep. “A boost of energy coming from your dinner, which may have consisted of pasta, rice or bread, can act as a short-lived stimulant, causing you to feel more awake immediately after a meal,” says Lockwood. “Also, it is not recommended to lie down immediately after a meal, especially a big one, since it increases your chance for acid reflux.”

Keep it light. “If you go to Europe and places where there is not as much obesity as the rest of the world, people eat very late and they’re not necessarily overweight. That’s because they are walking everywhere and they are typically not eating a huge and heavy meal,” says Caplan. “Instead, it may be avocado and toast with a side of soup.”

There’s clearly no formula for healthy eating that applies to everyone for maintaining a healthy weight and avoiding illness, but paying attention to both what and when you eat might be a good place to start.

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Lose Weight Now: 3 Essential Tips You Must Know for Success

One of the biggest problems people trying to lose weight face is changing their old eating habits. In order to be successful (and keep the weight off), it is crucial that you are able to develop different eating habits.

Why not set yourself up for success? Give yourself the best chance ever of doing it this time! There are 3 essential tips that will assist you in this area. By implementing these tips you will empower yourself with tools that are necessary for long term weight loss success.

Tip #1: Curb Your Chance of Temptation

No matter how strong your commitment may be, there will be times when temptation will creep in and try wrapping its ugly arms around you. Being prepared is your best defense!!

Purge your kitchen/pantry/house of all the food items that no longer support your new way of eating. Having them around will only ensure that you can easily give into temptation when it comes calling.

If you have unopened cans/packages/jars, donate them to your local food bank or homeless shelter. That way the food isn't going to waste and you can feel doubly good about cleaning out your kitchen!

Another important way to curb your temptation is to never go grocery shopping when you are hungry. This is just a recipe for disaster. Everything that will sabotage your success will look oh-so-good with a hungry stomach. No amount of resolve or will is a match for a grumbling belly... so just don't do it!

As these changes become habit over time, you will automatically start looking at other ways that you can strategically cut down or eliminate many of the things that might otherwise threaten to derail your progress.

Tip #2: Arm Yourself for Success

So, your cupboards are bare and your belly is full... it's time for a trip to the grocery store!! First, make certain that you have a list of what you plan on buying; only items from this list are allowed into the grocery cart.

Stock your kitchen with those foods and ingredients that will help you lose weight. In addition to items you have listed for meals, be sure to include a few "quick grab" items for those times when you either want a snack or need something to eat immediately.

Good tips for quick grabs would include apples, bananas, nuts, mini carrots and hummus, celery (spread peanut butter on a few stalks and you have a great mini-meal). The important point is that it be quick and easy for you to eat.

Quick grabs are also great for another important element of arming yourself for success: always have one or two snacks with you wherever you go. Carry them in your pocketbook, tuck them in your desk drawer at work, pop them in the glove compartment in your car.

This will ensure you don't get caught off guard. How many times have you thought for certain you'd be home by a certain time, only to get stuck in traffic; or the line at the bank took forever; or you were delayed at work?

Employing these strategies will help you avoid situations that could derail your best efforts and keep you on track to achieve your goal.

Tip #3: Be Proactive, Not Reactive

The kitchen is stocked and you have snacks stashed in all the right places. It's a great start, but don't stop there! It is now crucial that you make a plan for your meals in the coming days. Without one, it is too easy to slide into old habits and make poor choices.

Being proactive involves thinking ahead about your meals: deciding what you will eat for lunch, figuring out what nights you will be able to cook a full meal; preparing the salad ahead of time if you will be coming home late; cooking extra so you have another meal for later in the week.

If you don't plan ahead, that leaves you susceptible to making decision from a reactive state: you leave the office late, you are now hungry, it will take you an hour to cook when you get home. On your drive back to the house you pass the great golden arches of McDonald's. Can you see where this is heading?

Avoid these types of situations by being prepared and planning. It is always far more empowering to act from a position of proactivity to one of reactivity. Doing so will increase your chances of long term success.

By implementing these 3 tips you will be taking steps toward your long term success. People who struggle to lose weight sometimes forget that their ultimate goal is actually a culmination of the success of many smaller goals.

Start using these tips today, and know you are on your way to losing the weight forever!

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/8385249

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Will Dairy Boost Your Weight-Loss Resolution?

If weight loss and dieting are on your New Year’s resolution agenda, an unlikely food group may be the help you need.                                                                                     Consuming dairy products as part of your daily diet can help keep weight down, according to several studies. Findings in the Journal of Nutrition demonstrated that higher-protein, high-dairy diets shaved off belly fat and increased lean muscle.

“One hundred percent of the weight lost in the higher-protein, high-dairy group was fat. And the participants gained muscle mass, which is a major change in body composition,” says Andrea Josse, lead author of the study and a graduate student in the Department of Kinesiology at McMaster University.

In addition, a Harvard study, which suggests that the food quality is more important than its calorie count, found that eating specific high-quality foods was linked with less weight gain over time. Its data showed that the more daily servings people ate of fruits, vegetables, nuts, whole grains and yogurt, the less weight they gained. In fact, the research found that each extra daily serving of yogurt prevented 0.82 of a pound of weight gain.

The Nutrition and Metabolism journal reported a study in which participants who consumed three or more servings of dairy a day after weight loss were able to eat more calories without gaining weight than those who didn’t consume dairy.

Milk is nutritionally unique in that it is a great source of nine essential nutrients: calcium, potassium, phosphorus, protein, vitamins A, D and B12, riboflavin and niacin. It provides three of the five “nutrients of concern” that children do not get enough of: calcium, magnesium and potassium.

By combining a high intake of nutrient-rich dairy with regular physical activity, it won’t even feel like you’re trying to lose weight.

“However, as with any diet, you must be realistic. Results take time, so first commit to getting through January to establish a real routine,” says Alyssa Greenstein, a registered dietitian with the Dairy Council of Florida.

According to a National Health and Nutrition survey, 86 percent of women and 76 percent of men fail to meet the recommended dairy intake of three servings each day. That means the majority of Americans don’t have satisfactory levels of essential nutrients like potassium, zinc, calcium and folate. These levels plummet when dieters attempt to trim calories by purging dairy.

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Interested in Leading A Healthy Lifestyle? Things That You Should Do

If you are one of the people who want to lead a healthy lifestyle, here are a few things that you should do to have the lifestyle of your dreams.

It's all about the diet
'You are what you eat' is a popular line that is true. For you to be healthy, you need to eat right. This means that you need to ensure that the food that you eat contains all the necessary nutrients. The food should contain: proteins, vitamins, carbohydrates, oils, and other macro and micro nutrients.

The first meal that you need to watch out is your breakfast. This is because this is the first meal of the day and gives you all the energy that you require throughout the day.

It has been shown that many people tend to eat more minerals and vitamins and less cholesterol and fat. This is wrong and it results to low cholesterol levels in the body and a leaner body that is unattractive.
To be on the safe side, you should eat a meal composed of carbohydrates, proteins, and small amounts of fats. To get these nutrients, you need to consume a variety of foods.

Other than breakfast, it has been shown that many people tend to get it wrong when it comes to the snacks that they eat. It has been observed that many people eat snacks that contain plenty of carbohydrates. The result of consuming plenty of carbohydrates is plenty of calories in the body which results to weight gain.
To be healthy you should eat fruits and vegetables as snacks. The good side with these snacks is that they play a vital role of boosting good health.

The fruits and vegetables aid in: reducing the risk of cancers (such as colon cancer), improving memory, enhancing the immune system, promoting cardiovascular health, and beating the signs of ageing.
For ideal results, you should consume at least five servings of the snacks every day.

Incorporate healthy habits
You can't have a healthy lifestyle if you keep on engaging in unhealthy habits. For example you can't be healthy if you smoke or drink excessive amounts of alcohol. This means that you should quit smoking. You also need to drink alcohol in moderation.

Another healthy habit that you should practice is dental hygiene. It has been shown that people who practice proper dental hygiene tend to live 6 years more than those who don't observe proper dental care.
Researchers say that dental plaque enters the bloodstream thus blocking blood vessels. This results to heart diseases and other diseases such as stroke and diabetes. These diseases usually shorten the life expectancy of a person.

Proper dental care involves brushing of teeth for at least twice a day. You should also floss at least once every day.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/8372526

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Weight Loss Program: Motivate Yourself For Losing Weight

We all have to deal with excess weight after the holidays, but we also know that it is not so easy to follow a weight loss program or a diet to lose fat. We need motivation to start the program and complete it. Here we are going to discuss the top 4 weight loss motivation tips. Listen, only if you are able to motivate your mind about losing weight, you'll be achieving it one day.


Otherwise you'll be just dreaming of those wonderful things that would be happening once you lose pounds of weight from your body - but that won't be happening if you don't motivate yourself to loss weight! So, start motivating yourself through the following top 4 weight loss motivation tips.


1- Hitting the gym and lifting weights will surely increase your weight. But should you stop there? Never! You'll see an increase in weight you were building muscles while lifting weight. And muscles weighs more than fat. For the same reason you may find an increase in your body weight in the initial stages. But then you'll start losing weight in no time.


2- Just think about what you'll be able to do once you starting losing weight. Now, take a snapshot of yours and take a print out of it. It should be the "before" pic of yours - after you have succeeded in losing weight. Your plans should be to take that "after" pic - which will be looking awesome with you having succeeded in losing weight!


3- Never withdraw yourself from weight loss programs once you start it - thinking that it is tough and you won't be able to continue any longer. The fact is - only the first few weeks are the toughest. And once you are able to go further through the same weight loss program for a couple more weeks, you'll see you losing weight pretty easily than those early weeks.


4- Never make a plan to lose weight all at once! Did you put on weight overnight all at once? So, why should you lose weight all at once? You weren't knowing that you were putting on weight since the process is pretty slow. But it is continuous. Take note of the word "continuous". You should plan to tackle it doing things for losing weight in a continuous manner. Yup, you should be consistent in following your weight loss programs.


Only then you'll be able to lose weight the same way as you put on weight!


Also remember this last part of any weight loss plan is rest: it might seem not extremely essential, but whenever you are burning that fat, the body will probably be taxed and you will be tired. Keep in mind to get at least 8 hours of sleep every night!

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Could you benefit from a bit of tough love?

I was speaking to someone the other day that had lost a lot of weight recently. Apart from the obvious change in her appearance, one of the other things I noticed was her renewed confidence, and enthusiasm for everything health and fitness.

Being interested in her story, I asked her what she thought the keys to her success were so far.

The first thing she mentioned was that she’d made a conscious decision to make this year the year about her, where she put herself and her health first, instead of putting the rest of the family’s needs first.

Secondly, she consulted a dietitian with a reputation for handing out tough love, holding people accountable and not accepting excuses.

Thirdly, she started to exercise, starting out gradually and progressing to jogging, participating infun runs with friends and work colleagues, and even joining the gym.

What I found most interesting about her story, was the bit about the tough love and how important that was to keeping her accountable and motivated at the beginning of her weight loss journey.

Recently I also read a post on our weight loss forum where one of the regular contributors dealt some tough love to a new member who wanted to call out her behaviour publicly and get open and honest feedback from people who had been there themselves and got the t-shirt.

What struck me about both examples was that the recipients of the tough love welcomed it and was motivated by it.

But not everyone responds positively to this type of feedback / encouragement, often to their own detriment.

Tough love is best served by those that have been where the recipient has been, or has helped lots of people to lose weight and keep it off.

At the end of the day, they know that it is the results that count, and sometimes something as challenging as losing 10kgs, 20kgs, 30kgs or more calls for drastic action and the putting aside of one’s feelings.

If you respond well to being challenged, maybe a little bit of tough love could help you to lose weight and start leading the healthy lifestyle you dream of.

If that’s the case, we encourage you to get it from wherever you can. That includes from our weight loss forum, which is free to join, or from health professionals like dietitians, personal trainers,weight loss program providers, naturopaths, etc.

Good luck with your weight loss

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The Golden Rules of Weight loss

The golden rules to leading a healthy lifestyle and successful weight loss are;

Keep it real
Keep it simple
Keep it going

A Simple Guide to Nutrition

When it comes to food, keep it real and simple! We want to eat foods that have not been (highly) processed and have reduced nutritional value. Food and its nutrients should be consumed in its whole complete form, wherever possible, enabling our body to acquire all the available nutrients from the food source.

Nature delivers food raw, not in colourful packaging! As a general rule of thumb, if it looks like it came from the ground or an animal (in its original state, or very close to it) then it’s probably better for you.

Portion control is a crucial element of weight loss and weight management. Aim for smaller portions spaced out over four to six meals per day (dietitians generally recommend three main meals and two snacks each day and we base our diet plans on three main meals and three snacks each day).

Consuming smaller portions over an extended period allows our bodies to stabilise our appetite, helping to reduce cravings. Eating regularly eases the feeling of hunger that can lead to overeating when we skip meals.

Be sure to sip water throughout the day, eat slowly (twenty minutes is a good target to have for a main meal) and remember to enjoy your food. This will improve digestion and your ability to manage portions effectively.

A Simple Guide to Exercise

Keeping it simple with exercise, simply means moving more.

Exercise is essential for optimum health. Regular exercise has been shown to decrease the risk of many serious health conditions including Heart Disease, Osteoporosis, Diabetes, Depression &Obesity. Moderate and high intensity exercise sessions are great for burning loads of energy fast, but we should never underestimate the power in simple activities like walking, stretching andlifting. Early morning walks and regular incidental exercise helps to speed up our metabolism, burn continuous energy throughout the day and will add years to our life…literally.

The key to keeping things interesting with a fitness routine is trying new types of exercise. And there are many different types of activities to try, including gym classes, swimming, bike riding, walking,running, Pilates, yoga or even dancing. The secret is to find something you enjoy. This will make it easier to turn an occasional exercise session into a healthy lifestyle built on a foundation of daily exercise.

A Simple Guide to Healthy Behaviour

Finally, good health and weight loss success are simply byproducts of healthy habits.

Our daily habits are the collection of little things that keep everything on track, even when we don’t ‘feel like doing it’. Focusing on two or three simple health tips each week and aiming to make them part of our daily routine before adding new ones is the key to changing our lives.

Lifestyle change comes with its challenges. Bad days are inevitable. Maintaining a positive attitudeand consciously changing our mindset will ensure such days occur less frequently and don’t derail our progress.

Essential this requires keeping our thoughts in check. It’s ok to want to push ourselves harder, but not to put ourselves down in the process. Negative self-talk is our enemy and won’t help any of us to achieve a healthy lifestyle balance.

Rather than seeing healthy food choices and exercising as something to be dreaded, instead see it as an opportunity and a necessity to achieving your health & lifestyle goals for a better future.



Good luck with your weight loss

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Weight Loss Tips: Powerful Tools To Shift Mindset for Weight Loss Success

Being able to cause an immediate shift in your mindset from negative to positive takes practice. Being a Master of deleting out negative thoughts, beliefs, conversations and actions as quickly as possible will greatly increase your weight loss success or any other success in your life.

Why these tools?

• Decrease "Noise" in your head
• Decrease/remove negative experience patterns
• Interrupt a habitual negative habit
• Decrease/remove fears
• Shift/expand your perception
• Increase/accelerate results
• Detox your emotions

GRATITUDE TOOL - If you are focused and sometimes obsessed with losing weight you may forget to be grateful for who you are right now.

There are several ways to practice gratitude daily in your life. One way is writing 1 to 3 things you are grateful for at the end of the day in a personal Gratitude Journal. A great time to do this is right before you
fall asleep. Gratitude is the last thing your brain remembers before falling into a deep restful sleep.

RECEIVING TOOL - Being able to receive in multiple ways is critical for allowing your new beautiful ideal body to show up. If you are not receiving in the smallest of ways you are not going to receive in big ways.
The most important receiving for weight loss success is: Completely embrace who you are right now. Notice when you are not and use the Reset Tool to re-program your mindset.

RESET TOOL - Use this tool right after you experience a negative thought, belief, conversation or action. Seconds after the negative moment say "RESET" aloud (or silently given the situation). Replace the negative with a powerful statement. A general statement you could say to RESET any moment would be, "I choose powerful thoughts and beliefs!"

Always remember that no one tool works the best or does everything. Begin with one and practice it for at least one week or more. Notice which tools work best for you.

Carry a 'how to' of the tool you are practicing. Why? It's a challenge to remember positive things to do when we are stuck. In fact, it is usually the last thing on our minds.

I prefer the portable and simple tools. I find I use them more often and they are always with me. You can keep that in mind as you learn about more and more tools.

Do not forget to add the things you already use that work.

It is really important to know that you may not notice immediate results in the beginning. Keep practicing and remember the results will start to accumulate exponentially.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/8228114

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Five Things You’re Getting Wrong About Weight and Weight Loss

If I’m thin then I’m healthy, right? Wrong. There are several misconceptions people have about weight, losing it and what’s healthy. Here’s the low-down on some myths we’re better off busting.

Kids have to lose weight to shed obesity: As children grow, they put on weight, but how much is normal, and how much is excessive and potentially a hazard to their health? In the latest study, published in the journal Lancet, researchers from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases at the National Institutes of Health developed a mathematical model to differentiate between healthy weight gain and the extra pounds that contribute to obesity.

The model takes advantage of more accurate assessments of how many calories heavier children take in, as well as how quickly and efficiently they burn off those calories, and the ratio of fat to muscle in their bodies. The resulting model shows some kids can outgrow their obesity around puberty even if they don’t lose weight. That’s because obesity is a measure of not just weight but the ratio of height to weight known as the body mass index (BMI), and as children grow, they transform fat into muscle, which can weigh as much, if not more than fat tissue. So kids with a high BMI that might suggest obesity may not actually be overweight.

Still, the researchers say that teaching children about portion control and balancing what they eat with physical activity to burn off excess calories are important lessons to learn early.



You can’t be fat and still be fit: A person’s level of physical fitness, as well as his weight, matters for overall health. A study in 2012 showed that overweight and obese people were at no greater risk of developing or dying from heart disease or cancer compared to normal weight people, but only if they were as metabolically fit as their slimmer counterparts. When it comes to premature death, it’s less about how much fat a person carries, but what kind of fat. Visceral or belly fat, for example, is considered more metabolically harmful than fat that sits just under the surface of the skin. Visceral fat, which is embedded more deeply within muscles and organs like the liver, release agents that can disturb the body’s energy balance, shunting calories into fat. Lean people can have high levels of visceral fat in their tissues, while overweight individuals may be carrying more subcutaneous fat and therefore could even be metabolically fitter than those who are slimmer.

Most people who put on weight, however, don’t enjoy a fit status for long. Eventually, the excess weight can contribute to higher rates of high blood pressure, diabetes, and heart disease.

You can eat what you want and just exercise to lose weight: Cutting calories by adjusting what you eat is actually the most effective way to lose weight. Ideally, consuming fewer calories and exercising is a more efficient way of dropping pounds, but for most people, passing up the chips is easier than sweating it out on a treadmill for an hour. Downing 140 calories from a can of soda, for example, takes only a few minutes, but would take half an hour of moderately intense walking to burn off. “You can greatly undermine weight loss efforts and general health by not considering the quality of the foods you eat. It is important to consider calorie density and nutrient density of foods to maximize exercise performance and improve health status,” says Gayl Canfield, the director of nutrition at Pritikin Longevity Center.




Long bouts of low-intensity exercise are best for losing weight: Fitness experts are trying to de-bunk the myth that pounds melt off faster with low-intensity aerobic exercise than higher intensity workouts. “It’s true the body burns proportionally more fat calories than carbohydrate calories at a lower training intensity, however, should you increase your exercise intensity into the cardiovascular zone you will burn more overall calories,” says Scott Danberg, the director of fitness at Pritikin Longevity Center. Mixing in some short bouts of high-intensity exercise can translate into benefits on the scale.

Eating protein is the best way to feel full and keep calories in check: Lean protein is indeed a good way to get filled up, but fiber is even better, because it comes with fewer calories. To make sure you’re not feeling hungry but still getting all your nutrients, load your plate with fruit, vegetables beans and grains.

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Myths Surround Breakfast and Weight

 Americans have long been told that routinely eating breakfast is a simple habit that helps prevent weight gain. Skipping breakfast, the thinking goes, increases hunger throughout the day, making people overeat and seek out snacks to compensate for missing that first – and some would say most important – meal of the day. “Eating a healthy breakfast is a good way to start the day,” according to the Web site of the United States surgeon general, “and may be important in achieving and maintaining a healthy weight.”

 


But new research shows that despite the conventional weight-loss wisdom, the idea that eating breakfast helps you lose weight stems largely from misconstrued studies.

Only a handful of rigorous, carefully controlled trials have tested the claim, the new report, published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, found. And generally they conclude that missing breakfast has either little or no effect on weight gain, or that people who eat breakfast end up consuming more daily calories than those who skip it.

But those trials have been largely overlooked, and their findings drowned out by dozens of large observational studies that have found associations between breakfast habits and obesity but no direct cause and effect, said Dr. David B. Allison, director of the Nutrition Obesity Research Center at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Dr. Allison and his colleagues scoured the medical literature and found that the only long-term, carefully controlled trial that randomly assigned people to routinely eat or go without breakfast and then measured the effect on their body weight was published in 1992.

That seminal study, carried out over 12 weeks at Vanderbilt University, had mixed results. Moderately obese adults who were habitual breakfast skippers lost an average of roughly 17 pounds when they were put on a program that included eating breakfast every day. And regular breakfast eaters who were instructed to avoid eating breakfast daily lost an average of nearly 20 pounds.

Both programs included an identical amount of calories, and each caused people to lose more weight than a program in which a person’s typical breakfast habits did not change.

The study was fairly small and limited, involving only 52 overweight adult women, but it suggested that as far as breakfast is concerned, the most important factor in weight loss may be how drastically you change your routine. “Those who had to make the most substantial changes in eating habits to comply with the program achieved better results,” the authors wrote in their paper.

Dr. Allison said that the findings “showed no effect over all of eating versus skipping breakfast, that people do equally well on either one.”

“You would think at this point that you would either abandon the idea or do some more randomized controlled trials,” he added. “But instead the association studies started.”

Through the years, the equivocal findings were wildly misinterpreted. Dr. Allison and his colleagues found about 50 subsequent articles on breakfast and body weight in the medical literature that cited the Vanderbilit research. Of those papers, 62 percent cited the findings inaccurately, and they were almost exclusively biased in favor of the idea that eating breakfast protects against weight gain.

Another study that became the basis of widespread misinformation was published in 2002. In that study, researchers looked at data from the National Weight Control Registry, which tracks thousands of people who have lost weight and kept it off for at least a year.

Data from the registry showed that after their weight loss, about 80 percent of people reported regularly eating breakfast. “There was no difference in reported energy intake between breakfast eaters and non-eaters,” the registry showed, “but breakfast eaters reported slightly more physical activity than non-breakfast eaters.”

The research showed only that eating breakfast was a common behavior among people who were actively trying to avoid regaining weight, just as diet soda might be a common drink of choice among dieters but not necessarily the cause of their weight loss.

But of 72 subsequent research articles on breakfast and weight loss that cited the registry study, about half overstated its findings, Dr. Allison found, and roughly a quarter suggested that it showed a causal relationship between breakfast habits and obesity.

In the real world, when people form an opinion, they tend to seek out evidence that supports it and discard anything that contradicts it, a phenomenon academics refer to as confirmation bias.

“Scientists are humans, and they’re susceptible to confirmation bias too,” Dr. Allison said.

In the meantime, a small number of randomized trials has continued to cast doubt on the protective effect of breakfast. At Cornell University, for example, scientists have showed in experiments that in some cases, but not all, depriving people of breakfast can lead them to eat more calories at lunch. But those extra calories do not make up for the calories they missed at breakfast, so at the end of the day, they still end up eating fewer calories over all.

The Cornell researchers have argued that for some adults, skipping breakfast may actually be a good way to reduce weight – not gain it.

Dr. Allison said that the true relationship between eating breakfast and body weight, if there is one, was still an open question. But observational studies that tout an association between the two are churned out “just about every week,” despite doing nothing to actually test or prove the claim.

“At some point, this becomes absurd,” he said. “We’re doing studies that have little or no value. We’re wasting time, intellect and resources, and we’re convincing people of things without actually generating evidence.”

As for why the subject has created something of an echo chamber of observational research, Dr. Allison said that unlike randomized controlled trials, which are expensive and difficult to carry out, sifting through large sets of observational data to find tantalizing associations is fairly low cost and easy to do.

“Just like bakers bake bread, scientists write papers,” he said, “and we get rewarded for writing and publishing papers.”

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