This is an epidemiological study, so you have to be careful about how you interpret it. They did try to account for general dietary intake via a questionnaire, but it can be hard to get accurate data this way. I still feel that the underlying cause here is that people who want to lose fat tend to take in more artificial sweeteners, and not that artificial sweeteners cause people to put on more fat.
Epidemiological studies are usually the only thing we can go by, though, because RCTs are hard to apply in many instances.
Edit: I also should mention that epidemiological studies are useful. Just that they may require interpretation and are not usually a smoking gun by themselves.
Weight gain or loss is just a numbers game of calories in vs calories out. Literally every diet that actually works boils down to a caloric deficit; and those that don’t work are because they fail to cross that line.
Any time you substitute something high calorie for low, it’s a step toward weight loss. So, artificial sweeteners (at least the zero calorie kinds like sucralose, aspartame, etc; not sure if high calorie sweeteners like high fructose corn syrup are considered “artificial” but it sure as fuck ain’t natural) are extremely useful as a weight loss tool.
The study linked could replace artificial sweeteners with almost any weight loss tool and find the same result. “Study links people who sign up for an initial gym membership to increased body fat adipose tissue volume!!” …like, no shit Sherlock, they’re there to lose it.
Be careful not to draw the wrong conclusion from a misleading headline.
I think it is much more likely that the way a human being metabolizes food is different then what happens in bomb calorimeter and trying to draw conclusions based on said device is not very helpful to understanding human physiology, but then again i am just some schmuck on the interwebs and i dont even play a scientist on tv
I’ve not used a calorimeter, but my understanding is that is just measures heat energy from burning things. Things like sucralose and aspertame likely WOULD read as caloric in that kind of measurement, because they contain chemical energy. The reason those sweeteners read as 0 in nutrition labels is because of how we metabolize food. Or in this case, how we don’t: we can’t digest sucralose and similar sweeteners. It goes in, your tongue says “yay!” and you poop it out.
Also a schmuck on interweb; but healthcare is my area of expertise, so I’ve got a handful of college level human anatomy & physiology, nutrition, and microbiology courses to draw from here. I was also a fatass who wanted to join the military back in the day, which required losing a lot of weight - decided to approach it as scientifically as possible (there’s a LOT of fad misinformation surrounding weightloss), and I can’t complain about the results.
What!? That makes no sense.
They saw an association between sweetener intake and change in fat over 25 years. Not relative to the population, relative to their past selves. How would a weight loss tool increasing your body fat over 25 years be obvious?
That’s my point - it makes no sense. They’re either overlooking something, or artificials have some influence on the calories out side of weight loss that we don’t know about.
They have a pretty detailed discussion section. The main hypothesis they support, based on plenty of other evidence, is that these drugs increase appetite. They motivate you to eat more calories, even though they contain fewer calories themselves.
But satiety is very complex, and it’s possible that sweetener replacements make people hungrier in the long run, leading to weight gain.
IIRC that was a popular opinion about artificial sweeteners for a while because pigs are raised on food with sweeteners, to make them eat more. That doesn’t mean sweeteners make you hungrier though, just that pigs like to eat sweet things so they eat more of it.
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Could not agree more. They over complicated weight loss and what you have to do so badly now. Keto, Shmeeto, No carb, All carb, fasting, starving, whatever. Just STOP. Exercise regularly & use like an 80/20 method where 80% of the time you eat quality, whole foods. Keep portions within reason. Splurge where applicable. Exercise often. There, DONE. And yes, you can even eat some sugar and it wont kill you, LOL.
This study is bogus.
Ive been using splenda and stevia for years now, and I would definitely say they have helped me with losing weight, combined wirh full on avoiding sugar and sugary foods. Steered clear of diet coke recently due to aspertame, but even that didn’t lead to weight gain much more than regular coke did.
Fat people try to list weight, more at 11
I wonder if the diet soda studies are related to this?
For instance, diet Coke intake is supposed to correlate with very bad health outcomes.
Edit: downvoted for a question in a Science community? Do better, people.
Recent WHO recommendations say that artificial sweeteners are not useful for weight loss, but used in moderation they are not terribly unsafe as far as current studies indicate. All the stuff saying artificial sweeteners are super scary and bad is just that, scare tactics. Or it takes a gigantic amount to be bad for you, but if you replace that amount of artificial sweetener with sugar then the sugar is just as bad or worse. Better just to avoid both.
I try to avoid single studies or articles about anything, but rather look to larger recommendations from WHO or other agencies that are less likely to be influenced by $$$. Looking at a single article or study is basically meaningless. Unless you’re Joe Rogan and you’re paid to sell everyone a meat eater diet or Dr. Oz with whatever his garbage of the month is.
My household has never has soda.
Could it be that people who are already predisposed to getting overweight try to avoid it by diet drinks, but fail because it’s genetics and they take more calories on average? Correlation=/=Causation?
