Watch what you eat to control weight gain

Watch what you eat to control weight gain

New Delhi: Avoid hot and crispy fried snacks, sweets, carbohydrates-rich food if you want to keep a check on your weight, but don`t forget to consume some calories for your body`s well-being, say experts.

Most of us avoid having food items with lots of calories, but it is good for the body in controlled form.

“Each and every individual has his own calorie requirement, which is based on his basal metabolic rate. If a person eats more calories than what he needs, he will definitely gain weight or if he eats less calories than what he needs, he will lose weight,” Annapurna Agrawal, nutritionist at Snap Fitness India, told IANS.

“If a person`s body requires 2,000 calories and if he or she eats food with 2,500 calories, the extra 500 kcal of what you eat will be converted into fat," explained Agrawal.

Junk food is a big no for the weight conscious people as it lacks essential nutrients like vitamins, minerals and proteins, and is instead high on fat and calories.

“You need to shun all your favourite fried snacks and those curries that have a lot of fat and are cooked in fair amount of oil,” Manik Pande and Meghana Surve, nutritionists at Talwalkar`s National Nutrition Centre, said in a joint statement.

They have even warned against intake of excess carbohydrates.

“Carbohydrates actually convert into fats after they are consumed. The body stores this fat and this adds to your body weight."

Grains and sugar, which are common in a diet, contain a large amount of carbohydrates. So, be careful while you consume them.

The summer season tempts you to go for chilled sodas and juices. These may refresh you instantly, but Pande and Surve advice that go for something healthier.

“Stick to water, lime juice and fresh fruit juices. Alcohol also is an evil beverage,” they said.

Also guard yourself against too many medicines.

“Anti-depressant medicines, birth control pills, allergy medications and blood pressure medications are some of the medicines that may cause weight gain,” said Agrawal.

Weight gain tied to changes in personality

Weight gain tied to changes in personality

Washington: Adding a few kilos can make people more thoughtful about their actions but they are also more likely to give in to temptations, a new study has found.

To understand how fluctuations in body weight might relate to personality changes, psychological scientist Angelina Sutin of the Florida State University College of Medicine and colleagues at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) examined data from two large-scale longitudinal studies of Baltimore residents.

"We know a great deal about how personality traits contribute to weight gain," said Sutin.

"What we don`t know is whether significant changes in weight are associated with changes in our core personality traits. Weight can be such an emotional issue; we thought that weight gain may lead to long-term changes in psychological functioning," Sutin said.

The studies, NIH`s Baltimore Longitudinal Study of Aging (BLSA) and the Baltimore Epidemiologic Catchment Area (ECA) study, included more than 1,900 people in total, of all ages and socioeconomic levels.

Data about participants` personality traits and their body weight were collected at two time points separated by nearly a decade.

In one study, a clinician measured participants` weight at the two time points; in the other study, the participants reported their weight at baseline and had it measured by a clinician at follow-up.

Sutin and colleagues found that participants who had at least a 10 per cent increase in body weight showed an increase in impulsiveness - with a greater tendency to give in to temptations - compared to those whose weight was stable.

The data didn`t reveal whether increased impulsiveness was a cause or an effect of gaining weight, but they do suggest an intimate relationship between a person`s physiology and his or her psychology.

People who gained weight also reported an increase in deliberation, with a greater tendency to think through their decisions. Deliberation tends to increase for everyone in adulthood, but the increase was almost double for participants who gained weight compared to those whose weight stayed the same.

"If mind and body are intertwined, then if one changes the other should change too. That`s what our findings suggest," Sutin said.

Sutin and colleagues speculated that this increase in deliberation could be the result of negative feedback from family or friends - people are likely to think twice about grabbing a second slice of cake if they feel that everyone is watching them take it.

These findings suggest that even though people who gain weight are more conscious of their decision-making, they may still have difficulty resisting temptations.

The study was published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.