For all you peeps who can't lose weight on 1200 calories . . .

[Miranda]

a new study of NHANES data concludes people misreport their energy intake. isn't that shocking.

Four decades of nutrition research funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) may be invalid because the method used to collect the data was seriously flawed, according to a new study by the Arnold School of Public Health at the University of South Carolina.

The study, led by Arnold School exercise scientist and epidemiologist Edward Archer, has demonstrated significant limitations in the measurement protocols used in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES). The findings, published in PLOS ONE (The Public Library of Science), reveal that a majority of the nutrition data collected by the NHANES are not "physiologically credible," Archer said.

These results suggest that without valid population-level data, speculations regarding the role of energy intake in the rise in the prevalence of obesity are without empirical support, he said.

The NHANES is the most comprehensive compilation of data on the health of children and adults in the United States. The survey combines interviews of self-reported food and beverage consumption over 24 hours and physical examinations to assess the health and nutritional status of the US population. Conducted by the CDC and the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the NHANES is the primary source of data used by researchers studying the impact of nutrition and diet on health.

The study examined data from 28,993 men and 34,369 women, 20 to 74 years old, from NHANES I (1971 – 1974) through NHANES (2009 – 2010), and looked at the caloric intake of the participants and their energy expenditure, predicted by height, weight, age and sex. The results show that -- based on the self-reported recall of food and beverages -- the vast majority of the NHANES data "are physiologically implausible, and therefore invalid," Archer said.

In other words, the "calories in" reported by participants and the "calories out," don't add up and it would be impossible to survive on most of the reported energy intakes. This misreporting of energy intake varied among participants, and was greatest in obese men and women who underreported their intake by an average 25 percent and 41 percent (i.e., 716 and 856 Calories per-day respectively).

"Throughout its history, the NHANES survey has failed to provide accurate estimates of the habitual caloric consumption of the U.S. population," Archer said. "Although improvements were made to the NHANES measurement protocol after 1980, there was little improvement to the validity of U.S. nutritional surveillance."

These limitations "suggest that the ability to estimate population trends in caloric intake and generate public policy relevant to diet-health relationships is extremely limited," said Archer, who conducted the study with colleagues at the Arnold School.

"The nation's major surveillance tool for studying the relationships between nutrition and health is not valid. It is time to stop spending tens of millions of health research dollars collecting invalid data and find more accurate measures," he said.

[Azza84]

cliffs?

[LoseTheKeg]

Basically, people lie about their calorie intake and how much they use.

[DulceJello]

Basically, people lie about their calorie intake and how much they use.

i tell people about my 3500 calorie vegas style buffet fest and people are surprised that it is possible to eat that much in one sitting. Cheesecake factory anyone?

[thehobbes]

Wut?! Next thing you know you'll be telling me I don't have to do 4hrs of elliptical every day to lose weight.

Seems like most people don't even bother to measure foods in grams, it's always "oh I can just eyeball it." lol

i tell people about my 3500 calorie vegas style buffet fest and people are surprised that it is possible to eat that much in one sitting. Cheesecake factory anyone?

Oh that place is AWESOME. BRB huge pasta dinner and then delicious pb cup fudge cheesecake for desert, BOOM - PRs everywhere the next day.

[superja]

Seems like most people don't even bother to measure foods in grams, it's always "oh I can just eyeball it." lol

Me irl.

[sonti]

But.................. I'm unique.

[oregonchick76]

But.................. I'm unique.

as in...a snowflake?

[megdaig]

Wow....800 calories off is massive and I totally believe it....

"I don't know why I'm 200# overweight! I only eat 1200 calories a day. I typically have a bowl of cereal with whole milk and a banana for breakfast, a supersized Big Mac and fries and a 32 ounce coke for lunch, and a salad from Chili's for dinner...."



And now I have friends expressing "why must we starve ourselves to lose weight?" all over FB so I post pictures of the massive amounts of food I eat to lose weight

[shesprints]

Someone should do a meta study on the accuracy of data collection and interpretation in studies measuring people's reported vs. actual intake.

[[implosion]]

[Echo814]

I have had several people that have come to me for help argue with me that they are following 1200 cals and it's just not working. When I ask if they actually weigh their food and track the answer is "I enter everything in MFP" or some other phone tracking app but don't actually put the food on a scale. I've had a couple people accuse me of an eating disorder because I do weigh my food. In most cases it is underestimating food intake, over estimating cals burned and even underestimating how much fat they carry.

No one can 100% accurately track food intake but there are ways to make it as close as possible and most people don't want to put the work in. You can also see their brains exploding when you tell them they can lose on more than the 1200 cals and the argument that ensues after "I just can't eat that much!" Well obviously you could eat that much and more to get to the weight you are

[CathyVee]

I once experimented with 1200 calories for a few days just to see what it would be like and there is absolutely no way people are only eating that much and not losing weight. I felt absolutely exhausted.

[rockangel]

I once experimented with 1200 calories for a few days just to see what it would be like and there is absolutely no way people are only eating that much and not losing weight. I felt absolutely exhausted.

Summer 2012 i did the UD2.0, cals were at 1200 for 4 days and i felt awful. the diet is structured with 3 days of high cals and those days were amazeballs in terms of energy and strength, but then the 1200 days were zombie like, could barely move or think. I dropped 8 pounds in 4 weeks so it did what it was supposed to and i think I would have done even better if i hadnt of gotten injured (not because of the workout). But srsly if someone where eating that little i dont see how they do hours of cardio like they claim and not loose weight.

[shesprints]

rockangel, that sounds intense/painful. My brother did a program like that back when he was obsessed with his six-pack--was literally eating 1200 a day sometimes (and low-carb!) at 6'0'', 180lb. That didn't last long, he blacked out in the gym and crushed his hand under a weight. POor kid. He's OK now. No six pack but better priorities.

Insanity is in my family, because I ate 800-1000 calories a day at one point. I lost 20 lbs in about 2 months, from 110 to 90lb. That was called anorexia. Nowadays if I tell people that they go 'pfft, you were just on a diet.' You know, because 1000 calories is actually an OK amount to consume! And 90lbs at 5'5'' (I had not yet stopped growing, was 14 at the time) is the beauty standard, don't you know.

[Miranda]

Someone should do a meta study on the accuracy of data collection and interpretation in studies measuring people's reported vs. actual intake.

here's one review of several studies where self-reported food intake is measured against doubly labelled water. nothing new under the sun there (the review is from 2001 ).

aside from bodyweight, dietary 'restraint' seems to be one player. apparently, the more you want to stick to 'a diet' or 'eat healthy' the more you underreport little fibs here and there.

CONCLUSION

This review has demonstrated that, regardless of the dietary methodology employed to assess habitual diet, true energy intake is consistently underreported by certain groups within the population. As the ability to identify underreporters of dietary energy intake improves, it may seem that the next logical step would be to address what to do about underreporters of true intake. Proposed ideas to account for the reporting error have focused around two methods:1) removing the underreporters from the data set, or2) statistically correcting “reported” intake to represent true intake. Although the merits of these approaches are being investigated, it is our opinion that which foods are being underreported is of even greater importance than the magnitude of underreporting. For example, if the observed underreporting of energy intake on dietary surveys is due to a random omission of foods or an underestimation of portion size, techniques to account for this error, such as energy adjustment, should improve nutrient intake estimates. If, however, only certain types of foods are consistently underreported by some population groups, suggestive of a systematic bias, misleading conclusions will be drawn with regard to diet and disease relationships. Indeed, a recent study found that underreporters of energy intake reported consuming fewer foods rich in fat and sugar and reported higher vitamin C and fiber intakes than participants with a reported energy intake in the normal range (13). Goris et al. (12) found similar results with respect to fat intake.

[schnauzers]

Thanks for posting this! Interesting, although I guess not that surprising.

[Miranda]

Thanks for posting this! Interesting, although I guess not that surprising.

i admit it's not a STOP THE PRESS! newsflash. researchers have known for decades that self-reported food intake is not accurate. now that knowledge is onto the peoples.

i must say though i found it amusing to see an analysis of national survey data of over 60,000 people across four decades conclude 'hogwash'

[schnauzers]

i admit it's not a STOP THE PRESS! newsflash. researchers have known for decades that self-reported food intake is not accurate. now that knowledge is onto the peoples.

i must say though i found it amusing to see an analysis of national survey data of over 60,000 people across four decades conclude 'hogwash'

I guess it's not surprising for those of us that understand proper tracking. But I bet that the 'I eat 1200 cals per day, I swear; and I can't lose weight!' types will find it...a good lesson I'm gonna bookmark this for sure for when people I know claim they eat so little and still can't lose weight.

[MadCatLady]

So true! Friend insisted last night she only eats 800 cals a day. This whilst we were both eating a chicken kebab which for sure was at least 800 on its own.

(She also told me that drinking water flushes the fat away. Evidently not)

[dsm246]

I've had a number of friends ask me why they can't lose weight when they are only eating 1200 calories a day. They never like my answer which is to tell them to buy a food scale and measure out everything for a few weeks because the most likely cause is that they are under estimating their calorie intake. No one ever wants to hear this particular answer and rarely do that follow that advice. If they insist it can't be that, I tell them "Well, it can't hurt just to sanity check that by logging everything for a few weeks right?" But nope, they rather try some bizarre new diet than just measure their food. I guess I can point them to this study now too :-)

I think that fast food, convenience foods and food advertising have totally messed up the average person's ability to gauge portion size and the caloric density of foods.

[coconuttree2009]

I am not surprised at all. People who cannot lose weight on 1200 need to be honest with themselves. Sometimes it's not just not weighing the food, a lot of it is also to do with little bites here and there that 'so small that do not count'...

[LaBellaVita1]

I try stick to and under 1200 cals a day however I haven't lost any weight and I work out about 3-4 times a week.
I used MyFitnessPal religiously and even carry around my scales.

According to MFP they say I should be on 1200 a day, however I do other online tables that suggest I should be having 1600 or so.

Sometimes I dont know what to do.
Ill stick to Chicken Breast and Veggies from now on maybe.

[kimm4]

I try stick to and under 1200 cals a day however I haven't lost any weight and I work out about 3-4 times a week.
I used MyFitnessPal religiously and even carry around my scales.

According to MFP they say I should be on 1200 a day, however I do other online tables that suggest I should be having 1600 or so.

Sometimes I dont know what to do.
Ill stick to Chicken Breast and Veggies from now on maybe.

Are your stats updated? If so, you're at the lowest end of the scale for your height. If you're not happy with how you look at this point, it's a clear indicator you're undermuscled and you need to shift your focus to building.

You're thought process is backwards.

[thisiskellyd]

I once experimented with 1200 calories for a few days just to see what it would be like and there is absolutely no way people are only eating that much and not losing weight. I felt absolutely exhausted.

I was exhausted too... but didn't lose weight.. it was insane.. I did 1200 for 4 weeks from a 1500 BMR for comp prep, 200g protein a day with <100g carbs a day.. All of my protein was from chicken or fish. I recomped to about 10% body fat but didn't lose any weight. That was kind of annoying.

[AutumnHB]

invest in a food scale. I got mine for like $15. best 15 bucks I've ever spent.

[QueenofNorway]

If your nutrition is taken care of, maybe you should look at your activity level

I try stick to and under 1200 cals a day however I haven't lost any weight and I work out about 3-4 times a week.
I used MyFitnessPal religiously and even carry around my scales.

According to MFP they say I should be on 1200 a day, however I do other online tables that suggest I should be having 1600 or so.

Sometimes I dont know what to do.
Ill stick to Chicken Breast and Veggies from now on maybe.