Eating out frequently and consuming large, energy-rich portions can result in excess calorie intake and weight gain. Now a new study suggests people don't have to stop eating out to lose weight, even if they dine out frequently, as long as they take a mindful approach to eating. A report on the study is scheduled to appear in the January/February 2012 issue of the Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior.
Timmerman & colleagues recruited 35 healthy females aged between 40 & 59, & who often ate out, to participate in the study.
"Based on what they learned from this study, for those individuals who eat out often, developing the skills needed to eat out without gaining weight from the excess calories usually consumed at restaurants may be essential to long-term health."
About half the females joined the intervention group, while the other half were in the comparison group.
The researchers desired to focus on this section of the population because females have a crooked to put on weight around the time of the menopause, around the waist, which puts them at higher risk for heart issues & diabetes.
The females in the intervention group took part in a 6-week Mindful Restaurant Eating program, designed to prevent weight gain by helping them learn how to reduce their calorie & fat intake while eating out.
The comparison group done no particular program, but were monitored in the same way.
Although the main point of the study was not weight loss but weight maintenance, & most of the participants (69%) did not set out to lose weight, the intervention group lost significantly more weight (on average, one.7 kg per participant in the coursework of the 6 weeks).
The intervention group participants also ate fewer calories & less fat every day, scored higher on "diet-related self-efficacy" (fundamentally the extent to which they believed they could accomplish what they wanted with their diet control), & had fewer barriers to weight management while eating out than the comparison group.
Overall, the intervention group members reduced their every day energy intake by 297 calories after the finish of the program, which would report their weight loss. But, Timmerman said only some (about 124 calories) of this reduction in every day calorie intake could have come from eating less while eating out, proposing that they also ate fewer calories at home.
Timmerman said the "number of times that participants ate out, as captured in the 3-day 24-hour recalls did not significantly decrease" from the outset to the finish of the intervention period. This showed that the "participants could successfully manage their weight while continuing their usual, frequent eating-out patterns," he added.
