Sure, keeping a diary is a great way to express your deepest thoughts. But did you know that it may help you to take control of your weight loss? A recent and far-reaching weight-loss study shows that dieters who write down everything they eat each day lose twice as much weight as those who don’t!

Actually, this advice is nothing new; countless nutritionists and weight-loss programs have long recommended diaries for their clients. “Food diaries are a ‘powerful self-management technique.’ They help you figure out where the extra calories are coming from,” says Victor Stevens, senior investigator at the Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Research in Portland, Oregon. “It works best if someone else looks over your food record. When you put yourself in a position where you are accountable for your behavior, it changes behavior.”

“There is a misconception that nobody can lose weight, but in this study, two-thirds of them lost enough weight to make a difference to their health,” says Stevens. The study’s findings, which were recently published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, found that these weight-loss techniques may be effective for all participants. In particular, African-Americans, who are often underrepresented in studies, suffer from a high rate of obesity and weight-related illnesses. The study was sponsored by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute.

The study’s subjects included 1,685 overweight or obese adults weighing an average of 212 pounds, 44% of which were African-Americans. Participants were encouraged to try to lose at least nine pounds in six months. To accomplish this, they were told to consume about 500 fewer daily calories, eat plenty of fruits and vegetables, and do about 180 minutes per week of moderate-intensity physical activity. In addition, the dieting subjects kept daily food and exercise records, which found:

• Those who kept their food diary six or more days a week lost an average of about 18 pounds in six months. Meanwhile, those who didn’t keep diaries lost an average of about nine pounds.
• Those who lost the most weight also attended more group meetings and exercised more. Although some participants exercised 300 minutes or more each week, the average participants exercised about 117 minutes a week.
• Among the subjects, 69% lost nine or more pounds; this amount may improve some health measures, including blood pressure, joint pain and pre-diabetes.
• Among the subjects, 69% of black men and 59% of black women lost at least nine pounds.

Following the “DASH” Diet

For the food diary study, the participants were instructed to follow a specific diet. Known as the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) diet, this plan calls for consuming:

Ø  9-12 servings of fruits and vegetables daily

Ø  2-3 servings of low-fat dairy foods daily

Ø  25% or less of total calories from fat

Ø  A low-sodium diet, consisting of 2,400 milligrams or less of sodium each day.

Ø  No more than one alcoholic beverage a day for women; no more than two drinks a day for men. (One drink equals 12 ounces of beer, 5 ounces of wine or half an ounce of 80-proof liquor.