Go Out to Eat and Still Lose Weight
 

- Reported, January 16, 2012


 

(Ivanhoe Newswire)- Going out to eat has become a very popular American habit. Most of us know that eating out can also lead to excess weight gain and an increase in calorie intake due to large portions of high-calorie foods served in restaurants. So it might come to a shock to hear that a new study has proven that people can eat out and still loose weight.

Researchers at the University of Texas at Austin enrolled 35 premenopausal healthy women between the ages of 40 and 59 who frequently eat out in a six week program called Mindful Restaurant Eating, a weight-gain prevention intervention that helps develop the skills needed to reduce caloric and fat intake when eating out. Research showed that participants lost a significant amount of weight, had increased diet related self-efficacy, had lower average daily caloric and fat intake, and had fewer barriers to weight management when eating out.

The main investigator on this study, Dr. Gayle M. Timmerman, PH.D., R.N., is quoted as saying, "Although the intention of the intervention was weight maintenance and the majority of participants were not dieting with the intent to lose weight at the start of the study (69%), on average the intervention group lost 1.7 kg during 6 weeks. The number of times that participants ate out, as captured in the 3-day 24-hour recalls, did not significantly decrease from time 1 to time 2, indicating that participants were able to successfully manage their weight while continuing their usual, frequent eating-out patterns. Overall, the participants in the intervention group reduced their daily caloric intake by about 297 calories after completing the intervention, which would explain their weight loss. Only part of the calorie reduction (about 124 calories) can be accounted for during eating out, indicating that fewer calories were also consumed at home." Dr. Timmerman concludes, "Based on what we learned from this study, for those individuals who eat out frequently, developing the skills needed to eat out without gaining weight from the excess calories typically consumed at restaurants may be essential to long-term health."

This study shows a new creative way to help loose weight by developing skills in eating out at high-calorie restaurants that has become a popular American pass time.

SOURCE: Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior, January 2012
 

- WF Team