Posts Tagged ‘Appetite Control’
During our reading of the South Beach Diet for our review, we came across a statement by Dr. Agatson that “the major problem that I have with the Atkins diet is the liberal intake of saturated fats.” (p. 23). In Fact, the South Beach Diet goes out of its way to stress that it recommends the use of the right fats in its plan. The common perception of fat is frequently that of something to avoid, and that perception spawned many diets that were based upon the idea of limiting consumed fat. But, like most ideas to lose weight that concentrate on just one aspect of the problem, classifying all fats to be universally bad is just too simple of a solution. In fact, recent research tends to suggest that all fat is not the same, and that some kinds of fat may, in fact, be very beneficial to overall health. In this article, we explore some of the science of saturated and unsaturated fats in diets, how consumed fat may affect losing weight. In this first part, we offer a background of how the brain controls appetite based on information from hormones and fatty acids in the bloodstream.
This is the continuation of our exploration of how the fats that we eat affect our brain’s ability to control our appetite, which is particularly important when a person is trying to lose weight fast. Have you missed the first part of this article? In this second part, we explore some recent research that suggests that saturated fat (as opposed to unsaturated fat) interferes with the signals that allow the brain to control appetite. This potentially impacts how people following a low-carb diet like the South Beach Diet plan their meals.
It is widely accepted that weight loss and appetite control are related. Generally, a person will lose weight if they burn more calories than they eat. However, restricting calories (the typical method of dieting,) isn’t an easy method to lose weight for most people because it results in feeling hungry – and being hungry makes it easy to stray from the diet by responding to your body’s needs. A recent study concluded that eating a cup of raisins, ideally coupled with an increase in physical activity, resulted in several important health benefits, among them helping to control appetite by altering hormones that are responsible for feelings of hunger. As a result of this physiological change, the results suggest that eating raisins may be an “effective intervention to promote weight control.”
