Having a great breakfast can help weight loss because it reduces feelings of hunger for the rest of the day, not because we burn more calories eating in the morning, a study suggests.
The relative benefits of a large breakfast and a light dinner compared to a light breakfast and a large dinner have been debated for a long timeThe main argument against a late dinner being that you metabolize food less quickly as bedtime approaches, making it more likely to be stored as fat.
As such, there is a growing but by no means universal consensus that late dinners should be avoided and that it is best to have the main meal of the day in the morning.
But a new study suggests that eating most of your daily calories at different times of the day makes no difference to a person’s metabolism.
However, another key research finding suggests that regardless of the body’s metabolism, the timing of large meals may still be significant, with a hearty breakfast it is still potentially an effective way for some people to lose weight.
Study finds a hearty breakfast makes people less hungry for the rest of the day, which could make it easier to adhere low calorie diets to lose weightexperts said.
“This study is important because it challenges previous beliefs that eating at different times of the day leads to differential energy expenditure,” said Professor Alexandra Johnstone, from the University of Aberdeen.
“Research shows that, under conditions of weight loss, there is no optimal time to eat for weight control, and that the change in body weight is determined by energy balance.”
However, their findings suggest that for some people, eating a larger breakfast can still aid weight loss regimens.
“We know that appetite control is important in achieving weight loss, and our study suggests that those who consumed the most calories in the morning felt less hungry, in contrast to those who consumed the most calories in the evening,” he said.
“Eating more calories at breakfast may be beneficial for controlling your appetite for the rest of the day, so you can stick to calorie restriction without feeling hungry.”
But, assuming the calorie count stays the same, it doesn’t make any difference when the food is consumed, she says.
“We use controlled diets and measure energy expenditure using gold standard methods. We found that weight loss was similar with both diets, when consumed as a large breakfast and small dinner, compared to a small breakfast and large dinner (lunch was the same),” said Professor Johnstone.
“Each subject was on each diet for four weeks. There was no impact on energy expenditure. There was a positive influence of the big breakfast to control appetite throughout the day, with less hunger.”
Professor Russell Foster, a body clock expert at Oxford University who was not involved in the research, said it was “a good study”, although he disagreed with the conclusion that time makes no difference to metabolism. .
“What is important is that they have shown a potential mechanism for why a long-term heavy breakfast versus a heavy dinner may lead to weight loss, as previously reported,” he said.
“Participants who ate the high-calorie diet in the morning reported being much less hungry than those who ate the high-calorie diet in the evening. Thus, a large breakfast may be helpful in further suppressing appetite, and in the long run probably good for reducing food intake and thus leading to further weight loss.
“The rate at which this happens may be different between different metabolic types, such as lean versus obese people.”
Professor Foster said that, so far, laboratory studies in mice and humans under controlled conditions have shown that the same reduced calorie intake at the start of activity, rather than before sleep, can be used as a strategy to reduce body weight and decrease body mass. index (BMI).
In addition, previous studies have shown that the same meal eaten in the morning results in markedly lower blood glucose levels compared to the same meal eaten in the evening, he explained.
“The current study suggested that reducing morning versus evening caloric intake in obese individuals made no difference to weight loss, or key measures of metabolism such as blood glucose, over the 28-day study period,” he said. Professor Foster.
“One important difference was that the new study was done on already obese people living at home. Laboratory studies have most often been performed on healthy young men.
“So possible differences may be in body size, fat levels, and metabolic status between healthy men and obese older people: It’s harder to lose weight if you’re older and already obese.
“And there is a possibility that the participants at home did not adhere to the diet, they may have cheated.”
The study, published in the magazine Cellular metabolism and funded by the Medical Research Council, it was jointly run by the universities of Aberdeen and Surry. It also involved researchers from the Scottish Government’s Biomathematics and Statistics unit in Edinburgh and Maastricht University Medical Centre.
