Fad Diets: Lifestyle Promises and Health Challenges

Abstract

Chronic excess of dietary intake combined with reduced energy expenditure increase the positive energy balance. This transition in behaviour contributes significantly to prevalence of obesity, impairment of health, reduction in quality of life and increases health-care costs. While obesity has turned into a public health threat, with the government failing to reverse this growing trend, good number of people is undertaking fad diets with the hope to lose weight fast and easy. Furthermore, media and peers contribute to the popularity of fad diets as they put pressure to individuals who desire a certain body image, which leads to low self-esteem and perhaps eating disorders. Despite the fact that fad diets may appeal as simple way to lose weight, recent studies have shown that such diets in the long term are unsustainable and can bring adverse side effects to health. Consideration of the reviewed literature suggests that long-life changes in diet and lifestyle might be the best approaches to maintain a healthy weight in the long term. Overweight individuals should consult nutrition professions before adopting any fad diets to minimise the health risks and psychological impacts.

Facilitating Healthier Eating at Restaurants: A Multidisciplinary Scoping Review Comparing Strategies, Barriers, Motivators, and Outcomes by Restaurant Type and Initiator

“…While the changes in offerings may be encouraging, less reporting was found when examining the increase of specific health-promoting foods, as in the case of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and salads. The innovations or changes in regards to offerings demonstrated the restaurant response to food trends, including changes made in concordance to diet "fads", as in the case of low carb or high protein offerings, which respond to popular diets as in the case of the Atkins diet or Keto diets, among others [196], and in concordance with concerns over environmental sustainability and additives in the food supply, where restaurants were seeking to promote plant-based diets, as well as dishes made with local foods or additive-free ("clean") offerings [197,198].…”

What is healthy eating? A qualitative exploration

“…Interestingly, while these findings support the notion that there are limited weight-loss benefits when following popular diets, individuals are still opting to participate, as highlighted by results from the present study. Therefore, despite the saturation of different diets available, there is still limited knowledge on how popular diets influence and impact long-term adult food choices ( 47 , 51 , 52 ) .…”

“…Traditionally, popular diets are seen to influence food choice through limiting variety of food choice (47) , manipulating macronutrient ratios (47)(48)(49) and liquidising foods (47) . Defining popular diets remains ambiguous, as a handful of popular diets have been supported by scientific evidence, while others may not (47,48,50) . However, while popular diets can be defined in a variety of ways, they are most commonly described as any diet which promises rapid weight loss (47)(48)(49) .…”

“…Defining popular diets remains ambiguous, as a handful of popular diets have been supported by scientific evidence, while others may not (47,48,50) . However, while popular diets can be defined in a variety of ways, they are most commonly described as any diet which promises rapid weight loss (47)(48)(49) . A systematic review of several commercial and self-help weight-loss programmes was conducted to investigate the efficacy of weight-loss programmes in the USA (50) .…”

Fad Diets, Body Image, Nutritional Status, and Nutritional Adequacy of Female Models in Malang City

“…Based on Table 1, it can be seen that more than half (69.0%) of respondents currently (and ever) make efforts to lose weight by the fad diet method. e fad diet method is considered unhealthy because this diet directs a person to consume low calories and nutrients [10].…”