High-Fat, Low-Fat, High Carb, Low Carb; What’s the Best for Weight Loss?

You want to lose weight, right? So, you painstakingly watch every calorie you consume, and you shop for and plan your meals down to the last detail. But how can you be sure that what you’re eating is good for you waistline? What if your diet is actually making things worse? Well, new research may help to shed some light on the weight loss dilemma.

Researchers have found that two diets may offer the best results for healthy, long-lasting weight management. The study’s results, which were published in Archives of Internal Medicine, spotlight the benefits of both high-fat, low-carbohydrate diets (like the Atkins program) AND low-fat, high-carb diets.

A Bounty of Weight Management Benefits

The researchers found that that subjects following these two plans – all of whom consumed about the same amount of calories — experienced significant weight loss over the course of one year. According to the study’s author, Grant D. Brinkworth, both plans may offer valuable benefits.

“Both an energy-reduced, very low-carbohydrate, high-fat diet and a conventional high-carbohydrate, low-fat diet are equally effective for achieving weight loss in overweight and obese individuals. In addition, he stated that both plans showed similar effects for cognitive processes, such as working memory and speed of processing. However, the low-fat diet was more effective for long-term improvement in mood.

A Potential Cause for Celebration

Nevertheless, healthcare professionals are very excited about the study’s findings. “This study looked at one factor, and prior studies haven’t focused on psychological factors,” said Dr. Ewald Horvath, interim chairman of psychiatry at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine. “This is a great study focusing on something very important.” The majority of health care organizations, such as the American Heart Association, typically advocate higher-carb, low-fat diets, rather than the high-fat alternatives that the overweight and obese prefer.

The study focused on 106 overweight and obese adults, with an average age of 50. These subjects were randomly assigned to the low-calorie, low-carb, high-fat plan or the high-carb, low-fat diet, for a full year. For both diets, the daily calories were restricted to about 1,433 to 1,672.

At the end of the year, it was shown that the subjects lost an average of 30.2 pounds, in both groups. As for mood, both groups showed improvements after eight weeks, but only those in the low-fat group maintained these benefits.
While the reason for this not known, it may be due to the neurotransmitter serotonin, which plays a role in mood. It’s been found that higher amounts of carbs may increase serotonin concentrations in the brain. Meanwhile, higher amounts of fat and protein may reduce concentrations.

The researchers believe that a negative mood may promote overeating. Therefore, they recommend consuming a very low-carbohydrate diet, for longer than one year, as this may help to maintain good dietary habits and weight loss maintenance.

SOURCE: http://news.yahoo.com/s/hsn/20091110/hl_hsn/tofeelbetterlowfatdietmaybebest