Common Fat And Weight Loss Myths

The average person doesn’t always get their sixty minutes of physical activity. With the distorted image of portion size, many more people consume more calories than they are allowed in a day. Without exercise there is no way to cut down on the extra calories

Janine snorts in laughter. “Train your body to burn fat?! Like it doesn’t know how already? Come on! If you’re gaining weight, it’s because you’re taking in more calories than you’re burning up. Everyone knows that. A calorie is a calorie. It’s just a measure of energy in your food. If you want to lose weight, what you have to do is either cut back on the calories you take in or exercise to burn up calories—or both. But why

“THE REAL KEY TO DIETING IS TO EAT AS MUCH AS YOU CAN WHILE STILL LOSING BODY FAT. THEN, WHEN YOU REACH A PLATEAU, YOU MAKE A SMALL CUT IN CARBS AND CALORIES.”

Nowadays, undergoing weight loss is one of the major controversial issues facing America. Many believe that what you consume is more important than how much you consume. While others argue that in order to lose weight you must lose more calories than the calories you consume. Although both sides may be true, after reviewing the sources provided I have concluded that what you consume can be more important when trying to undergo weight loss.

Obesity is one of the most rapidly growing health epidemics in the United States and affects more than 60 million people. Despite recent efforts to understand and treat obesity, there has been little success in reversing the rising trend. There is convincing evidence that obesity is directly related to many health risks. As a matter of fact, morbidly obese people are at a high risk for weight related illnesses, such as high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, high cholesterol, and heart disease. However, research confirms that long-term weight loss success can help to significantly reduce these weight related health risks (Brethauer).

Obesity has become increasingly more prominent in American society. The Unites States has even been termed an overweight nation. Some twenty to thirty percent of American adults are now considered obese (Hwang 1999 and Hirsch et al 1997). With this in mind, Americans constantly look around themselves determining their weight status as well as that of those around them. While some Americans do fit the healthy category, others enter the underweight, overweight, and even obese categories, all of which can be unhealthy.

In recent times, obesity has come to be regarded an issue that needs prompt intervention. This book thoroughly reviews a number of approaches that can be adopted to prevent obesity from a public health perspective. In its 4th chapter, the book critically evaluates the various health consequences of obesity. This text can be viewed as an update of its previous edition. This has the effect of enhancing its credibility.

Although many individuals are uncertain about the increasing statistics associated with obesity, more than seventy percent of men and virtually sixty-two percent of women within the United States adult population are overweight or obese (Wilmore, Costill, & Kenney). Obesity refers to the condition of having an excessive amount of body fat. If an individual’s amount of body fat becomes too excessive, he/she is at a much greater risk of developing life-altering diseases such as heart failure, hypertension, type II diabetes, cancer, gallbladder disease, osteoarthritis, etc. (Wilmore, et al., 2008).

Obesity, the condition of being severely overweight, is a serious issue in the United States that is gradually beginning to affect more and more citizens. In recent years, the number of Americans suffering from this chronic disease has significantly increased. Researchers have found that nearly one third of the U.S. population is considered overweight and, on average, three hundred thousand individuals die yearly as a result of obesity (Hollands et al. 2). When one participates in little to no physical activity and their diet consists mostly of high fat foods, chances are they will gain weight. If someone becomes obese, they may develop serious health related issues that, in some cases,

Why We Get Fat and What to Do About It published by Gary Taubes is a controversial 217 page look at the obesity epidemic plaguing the world. Taubes spends the entirety of the report analyzing the common myths of weight gain and weight loss. Taubes himself is a correspondent to Science magazine, has had works published in the New York Times, and is an investigator of health policy research at the University of California’s School of Public Health.

It was merely a decade ago that the obesity epidemic was thought to only be a minor problem and had only alarmed a small number of endocrinologists interested by the size of the situation (James, 2008). However today, the problem of obesity is vast with more awareness of its presence by doctors and individuals alike. In fact, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention states, “More than one-third (34.9% or 78.6 million) of U.S. adults are obese (CDC, 2014)”. These numbers are outrageous and eye opening, leaving millions looking for a solution to this troubling epidemic. Obesity is not simply a cosmetic flaw as some might think, but is actually a very dangerous state of being for any individual to sustain long-term. Mentioned further in

Attention Step: How many of you all know of someone who is overweight? How many of you all know of someone who is dead because of weight problems? Obviously, a serious factor that is going on across the United States is obesity. According to The Gale Encyclopedia of Fitness written by the authors Rosalyn Carson-DeWitt and William Atkins, the definition of obesity means that it is a health condition where an excessive amount of body fat is inside the human body. This excessive body fat can cause health related issues including illness, disability, and worst of all, death (Carson-DeWitt and Atkins 615).

For example, when you get on an elliptical or treadmill you can push the "fat burning" button, it will be longer and lower intensity because that favors the muscles that are going to burn more fat. So if you do a jog instead of a sprint, you're burning more fat.” (lifehacker.com)

Unfortunately, for most people gaining weight is much easier than losing weight. It is not uncommon for a person to start developing poor eating habits, and then they let their weight gain go too far and get out of control.

One topic that has been talked about for many years within Kinesiology is the debate on whether exercise or diet is more important for losing weight and maintaining weight loss. While both or important for a person's individual health, a person's diet is essentially the foundation for a healthy lifestyle and an important factor in losing weight and gaining nutrients that can help the body develop. Many studies and experiments have shown that a healthy diet goes a long way in helping people lose more weight, but more importantly teaches them how to continue to treat their bodies in a healthy manner. Dieting has been shown to have a bigger impact on weight loss than exercise has. For this reason, it can be said that a good diet is more effective for weight loss as compared to exercise alone.