A study of 900 primary school pupils in Norway found that fat children ate healthy foods – such as fruit, vegetables, fish, and brown bread, as well as low-calorie cheese and yoghurt – more frequently than their normal-weight peers.
The research suggested that a good diet without exercise would not be enough to prevent weight gain.
So it ain\’t the junk food (which the thin children did eat), it\’s, as we all thought we knew, the relationship between calories in and calories used that determines.
However, the value of the research is slightly devalued by this:
His research, published in September, found that on average men burned 1,380 calories per day in the 1980s, the same as today, while women used 950 calories. The major change has been in calorie intake, which has increased by at least a third to 3,500 calories a day, he said.
If that we actually true then we\’d all be immovable lumps of fat already.
I found the figures about the calories burn in the 1980s unbelievable. I thought that the average man burns about 2000 calories a day just staying alive. Maybe the figures mean “from activity”.
“Bear in mind that in general average men need between 1,700 to 2,200 calories each day to provide basic energy and less than 1,500 calories will put a serious strain on your nutritional requirements and health. ” from http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_daily_calories_for_a_man
So that figure of 1380 is definately bogus.
Correct. It is not so much that the primary school kids don’t eat ‘healthy’ food, it’s that they eat too much of it; and then, instead of strapping on the skis … As to male adults consuming 3,500 calories/day, it seems rather extravagant. Then again, 40% of women in the UK are rumoured to wear size 16 or above; perhaps the average man isn’t far behind? I don’t see evidence of this down here in the Southwest; maybe it’s different up North?
If the ‘average’ man consumes 3,500 calories a day, that means an excess of about 1,000 calories per day, or a weight gain of approximately 2lbs per week, or over 7st in a year.
Bollocks, methinks
The major change has been in calorie intake, which has increased by at least a third to 3,500 calories a day, he said.
Really I gain on much less than that I’m over six foot and active.
[*] + 1 question mark.