Public The big fat lie: Britons eat 50% more than they say

Arnie Pye said:
My late mother weighed an enormous amount for her (tiny) height. And I would keep tabs on what she ate when I visited - and they weren't flying visits. She really did eat very little. In her case I think her problems were caused by polypharmacy. She was on lots of drugs that had weight gain as a known side effect.
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Various hormones can play a huge role as well. There was a study of the Biggest Loser contestants 6 years after competing, and their leptin levels were doing whacky stuff afterward. Their metabolisms stayed slow in the long term, basically remaining in the starvation mode triggered by heavy exercise and extreme dieting on the show.
 
Valentijn said:
Various hormones can play a huge role as well. There was a study of the Biggest Loser contestants 6 years after competing, and their leptin levels were doing whacky stuff afterward. Their metabolisms stayed slow in the long term, basically remaining in the starvation mode triggered by heavy exercise and extreme dieting on the show.
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Well that is a reliable source :p

Seriously though it would have been interesting to see how long lived this effect is.

From what I've read on the subject (and I've read a lot over the years for my job) doesn't lead me to think that hormonal imbalances and interesting biochemical effects are responsible for the big numbers in obesity in the western world. Hard facts like increasing portion sizes over time, higher calorie consumption, reduced physical activity and shorter working hours seems more persuasive to account for the majority of cases.

That isn't to say that human beings don't adapt to new norms etc, but the calories in vs calories out is still the best model to go by and the exceptions do not disprove the rule.
 
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arewenearlythereyet said:
shorter working hours
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This is where I'm not so sure. In the UK at least, we work quite long hours. That, to my mind, doesn't help. By the time folk commute home and get the dinner on etc. there's often very little time for anything else.

It's a whole pattern of life:
A high number of people work in cities. Many of those people can't afford to live near where they work so spend 1 or 1.5 hours commuting each way. Then of course if there's an accident, traffic jam, signal failure.....

Then the younger generation don't seem to have a cut off time and will be responding to work emails even late at night.

Much of life's basics, including food and a bit of exercise, go out of the window.
 
Invisible Woman said:
This is where I'm not so sure. In the UK at least, we work quite long hours. That, to my mind, doesn't help. By the time folk commute home and get the dinner on etc. there's often very little time for anything else.

It's a whole pattern of life:
A high number of people work in cities. Many of those people can't afford to live near where they work so spend 1 or 1.5 hours commuting each way. Then of course if there's an accident, traffic jam, signal failure.....

Then the younger generation don't seem to have a cut off time and will be responding to work emails even late at night.

Much of life's basics, including foot and a bit of exercise, go out of the window.
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Yes working hours in manual jobs is what I had in mind. This has significantly reduced over the last few decades as the so called developed counties shift occupations to more service based jobs. The longer working hours in desk based sedentary jobs is actually on the increase and this makes the chances of obesity higher since there is less opportunity to burn calories via exercise or being less sedentary outside of work time.

This is interesting:

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0019657

and this

https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/obesity-prevention-source/obesity-causes/physical-activity-and-obesity/
 
Since the challenge was out there and I need the practice for my new job, here is some guff on portion sizes from a reputable source:

https://www.bhf.org.uk/news-from-the-bhf/news-archive/2013/october/portion-distortion


"Individual curry ready meals and portions of crisps from family bags have ballooned in size by 50 per cent in the last 20 years, according to our new report into UK portion sizes.

Our Portion Distortion report compared the portion sizes of 245 products sold now with the portion sizes listed in a 1993 Food Standards Agency publication showing “typical weights and portions sizes of foods eaten in Britain’. The report findings show, compared to 1993, on average:

  • Individual shepherd’s pie ready meals have doubled in size, increasing by 98%
  • A stated portion of peanuts is 80% larger
  • Individual chicken curry ready meals are 53% larger
  • A portion of crisps from a family pack has increased by 50%
  • Individual chicken pies are 40% larger
  • Meat lasagne ready meals for one are 39% larger
  • A portion of garlic bread is 30% larger
The report reveals a portion of plain sweetmeal biscuits has increased in size by 17 per cent. It means if you were to eat one biscuit daily now, compared to 1993, you’d be adding 3,330 calories to your diet each year."

you can download the full report here:

https://www.bhf.org.uk/publications/policy-documents/portion-distortion-report-2013
 
And then on the other hand we have shrinkflation:

Shrinkflation is a rise in the general price level of goods per unit of weight or volume, brought about by a reduction in the weight or size of the item sold. The price for one piece of the packaged product remains the same or could even be lowered.
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Though to be fair I've noticed this more when the Invisible Man bought his favourite, childhood chocolate bar recently and whinged about the size of it.
 
Invisible Woman said:
And then on the other hand we have shrinkflation:



Though to be fair I've noticed this more when the Invisible Man bought his favourite, childhood chocolate bar recently and whinged about the size of it.
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I'm thinking that wasn't a Freddo frog bar? The size of Curly Wurlys are a disgrace and don't get me started on Toblerone.

overall though as a proportion of household income people are spending less on food and non alcoholic beverages than they did 30 years ago ...so food is proportionally cheaper, although there is a more recent real price increase since the stock market crash of 2007\8

so obesity over the medium term appears to be due to the combined effect of several things:
  • People having more money to spend on food
  • Eating occasions (e.g. snacking) and eating out has increased
  • Alcohol consumption (heavy) has increased
  • People are more sedentary in their occupations and spend less time being active out of work and travelling to and from work
  • Portion size has increased distorting peoples perception of what is the right portion (USA trend from quick service restaurants that has spread out...global brands are partly responsible for this)
  • Increased consumption of processed food that are calorie dense or have little impact on satiety (I.e. sugar or fat laden) with a reduced consumption of high fibre food

Most of this has happened within the last 20-30 years (within living memory) so no wonder people are confused about what they put on the questionnaire, bias aside.
Edited to clarify: alcohol consumption (binge drinking is more prevalent, per capita is the same\down depending upon the time scale you look at)
 
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arewenearlythereyet said:
..so food is proportionally cheaper
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Hmmm, so they say. I know that the cost of fresh fruit and veggies is really quite high. We tend not to eat processed food here much (Invisible Man's trip down memory lane aside).

A lot of this so called cheap food is processed food. You could buy a ready made lasagne more cheaply than the cost of preparing it from scratch with fresh ingredients. Ditto some other products.

You would know a lot more than me about this @arewenearlythereyet, but the manufacturer can buy ingredients so much more cheaply be they buy them in bulk....

I also wonder about some of the "inactive" ingredients - is it possible that they can affect how efficiently we burn those calories.
 
Invisible Woman said:
Hmmm, so they say. I know that the cost of fresh fruit and veggies is really quite high. We tend not to eat processed food here much (Invisible Man's trip down memory lane aside).

A lot of this so called cheap food is processed food. You could buy a ready made lasagne more cheaply than the cost of preparing it from scratch with fresh ingredients. Ditto some other products.

You would know a lot more than me about this @arewenearlythereyet, but the manufacturer can buy ingredients so much more cheaply be they buy them in bulk....

I also wonder about some of the "inactive" ingredients - is it possible that they can affect how efficiently we burn those calories.
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Yes but volume is key and it depends upon where it comes from. Nowadays the margins are pretty tight and the retailer expectations for service (which comes directly from the consumer) means that the more complicated things are, the more risk that you will lose margin based on increased shipping costs etc. so if you want authentic ingredients in your lasagne (as opposed to what you can source locally) it will cost considerably more to produce but also the volume will be lower (driven by consumer) because the price is higher...so you are in a chicken and egg situation. Basically the majority of people buy on price not quality. So in the absence of this sometimes intervention is required such as salt reduction reformulation and sugar tax on soft drinks. Basically food manufacturing and retailing is subject to consumer spending.

I'm not sure what you mean by inactive ingredients? Everything costs money so nothing is in there unless it has a function. Sometimes making an emulsion of oil and whey protein for example is cheaper (and more stable to heat) than fresh dairy cream? Or sometimes you have to stabilise something because it is made on a larger scale than in a kitchen....is that what you mean?

From a digestion point of view absorption studies mainly focus on the effect of large fibre type molecules or lipids. If you let me know what things you have in mind ?
 
arewenearlythereyet said:
The scale of people’s lying and inaccuracy about what they eat undermines dietary recommendations based on shaky research, experts said.
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There was a reality TV program a while ago where they followed people who were struggling to loose weight. Whilst they were lying in that they were eating many more calories than they admitted to I don't think is was deliberate they were just snacking without thinking. They looked genuinly shocked when they were shown what they were actually eating. Its very easy to do that if food is there (or if it is you habit to get it) or to under count calories.

Sometimes I think its easy to kid yourself about things.
 
Adrian said:
There was a reality TV program a while ago where they followed people who were struggling to loose weight. Whilst they were lying in that they were eating many more calories than they admitted to I don't think is was deliberate they were just snacking without thinking. They looked genuinly shocked when they were shown what they were actually eating.
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I was thinking of that show as well ... how many relatively normal eaters got cut from being aired when there wasn't good material for the grand reveal? Those types of shows have a clear goal ("Secret Eaters" was the name after all), and they're hardly going to show anything that disproves their theory.

"Saints and Scroungers" had a similar problem - either people were amazing do-gooders, or they were sponging off the system. The vast array of normality between the two (good people who need support) are completely unrepresented.

Mij said:
Awww, and don't forget the combo of 'secret' ingredients that keep us addicted. I've never known anyone (including myself) that can only eat half a bag of potato chips.
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I usually do that ... I've currently got half a bag in the cupboard that I started eating on Saturday :-P I feel a bit sick if I eat too much potato chips.
 
Valentijn said:
Various hormones can play a huge role as well.
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Not quite on the hormone thing but some factors can play a huge part in weight gain and over-eating.

I knew someone with polycistic ovarary syndrome who put on a lot of weight before it was diagnosed. It was due to insulin resistance which apparently gets worse the more weight you put on. The person I know knew she was eating too much but was feeling the need for more sugar and really ill without it. It took a long time to find a doctor who diagnosed it having just been on a course. The way to manage it was metformin which I is also used for type 2 diabetes - I've no idea what the real differences between the two are apart from with diabetes you get free prescriptions (in the UK).

My point being there are things that cause weight gain and some can be helped.
 
Valentijn said:
I was thinking of that show as well ... how many relatively normal eaters got cut from being aired when there wasn't good material for the grand reveal? Those types of shows have a clear goal ("Secret Eaters" was the name after all), and they're hardly going to show anything that disproves their theory.
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Good point.

[Edit]

Yes that was the show I was thinking of. I only saw a couple of episodes and I suspect that they did some form of filtering rather that only showing certain shows.

I thought it was interesting how unaware some people can be about things like that. I include myself in that group. But the other side of the some people don't eat much and put on weight some people can eat a lot and not put on weight and I was in that group for a long time (I think as you get older your body changes).
 
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