Allowing small portions of desired foods in meals linked to lower cravings and greater weight loss

Food cravings are the downfall of many dieters, who feel locked in an eternal battle with their willpower to resist the tempting sweets, snacks and other foods they love.

However, researchers in food science and human nutrition at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign say in a new study that eating dessert may be the optimal strategy for losing weight, keeping it off and keeping cravings at bay. Dieters in a clinical trial who incorporated craved foods into a balanced meal plan lost more weight during the 12-month weight-loss program and their cravings remained minimal through the subsequent 12 months of maintenance.

The work is published in the journal Physiology & Behavior.

Then-graduate student Nouf W. Alfouzan and nutrition professor Manabu T. Nakamura said that dieters’ food cravings decreased while losing weight and remained minimal as long as they did not regain weight. The participants were part of a larger project conducted with physicians at Carle Clinic in Urbana, Illinois, that aimed to broaden the outreach of an in-person weight-loss program called the Individualized Dietary Improvement Program by converting it to an online format called EMPOWER.

“We recruited obese patients ages 18 to 75 who had comorbidities like hypertension and diabetes and could benefit from losing weight,” Nakamura said. “Cravings are a big problem for many people. If they have a lot of cravings, it is very difficult to lose weight. Even when they are able to control their cravings and lose weight, if the cravings come back, they regain the weight.”

Although many dieters reported in prior research that their cravings decreased while losing weight, Nakamura and Alfouzan said it remained unclear whether these changes persisted when they reached their weight-loss goal or quit dieting while trying to maintain their weight. Alfouzan, the first author of the current study, wanted to investigate that along with whether reduced cravings correlated with greater weight loss.

The dietary program used in the study educates dieters about key nutrients, helping them make informed decisions about their food selections until sustainable dietary changes are achieved, Nakamura said. Dieters used a data visualization tool that plots foods’ protein, fiber and calories so they can enhance nutrition while minimizing the calories they consume.

During the first year, participants engaged in 22 online nutrition education sessions created by scholars at the university’s Center for Innovation in Teaching and Learning that included strategies for dealing with cravings.

“If you are eating and snacking randomly, it’s very hard to control,” Nakamura said. “Some dietary programs exclude certain foods. Our plan used an ‘inclusion strategy,’ in which people incorporated small portions of craved foods within a well-balanced meal.”

Every six months participants completed a questionnaire about their cravings for specific foods. These included high-fat foods such as hot dogs and fried chicken, fast food fats like hamburgers and chips, sweets such as cakes and cookies, and carbohydrates such as biscuits and pancakes.

The researchers also assessed the frequency and intensity of participants’ cravings with another survey. Using a scale ranging from 1 (never) to 6 (always), individuals rated themselves on statements such as, “Whenever I have food cravings, I find myself making plans to eat” and “I have no willpower to resist my food cravings.” The intensity of each dieter’s cravings was calculated by adding their scores for all 15 statements.

Dieters also weighed in daily after getting out of bed and before breakfast using a Wi-Fi scale that transmitted the data to the researchers so they could track the changes.

A total of 30 people began the weight-loss program, and the 24 who remained at the end of the first year had lost an average of 7.9% of their starting weight. Of these, 20 people completed the yearlong maintenance program, but because a few regained some of what they had lost, their average weight loss was 6.7%, the researchers found.

Participants who lost more than 5% by the end of the study experienced consistent reductions in the frequency and intensity of their cravings while those who lost less than that did not. The team also found that individuals’ craving for food in general and for specific types of foods such as sweets and carbohydrates diminished during the year of weight loss and stabilized during maintenance.

This finding suggests that individuals’ reduced cravings correlated with decreased body fat rather than the negative energy balance of dieting, Nakamura said.

“This basically debunks the hungry fat cell theory, a longstanding hypothesis that fat cells become starved for energy and trigger cravings, causing dieters to eat and ultimately regain what they lost. But that is not the case. As long as you stay at a healthy weight, your cravings will remain low.”

Of the 24 participants who remained in the study at 12 months, more than half reported they used the inclusion strategy to manage cravings, some people as frequently as one to three times a day, while others used it once a week or more. Those who used the strategy lost significantly more weight compared with other participants and experienced significant reductions in their cravings for sweet and high-fat foods, the researchers found.

Consistency is another key to managing cravings and weight, Nakamura said.

“The popular myth is you have to have a very strong will to fend off temptation, but that is not the case. Fluctuations in eating patterns, meal times and amounts trigger cravings, too. You have to be consistent.”