Crash dieting can lead to excessive binge eating--study

You might have reaped the benefits of following a crash dieting regime religiously; however, chances are high that this weight loss is temporary. The worst part, you might end up piling up more weight than what you lost.

As per researchers of the new study, crash dieting puts your brain in a stressful situation and this continuous phenomenon during your dieting period has the potential to reprogram your brain’s response to food, which in turn can force you to engage in binge eating.

While commenting on the study findings, lead researcher Tracy Bale from the University of Pennsylvania, said, "These results suggest that dieting not only increases stress, making successful dieting more difficult, but that it may actually 'reprogram' how the brain responds to future stress and emotional drives for food.”

After this change it’s likely you might not be able to curb your desire to eat (even if you are not hungry) when faced with a stressful situation.

Research findings
To come to this conclusion, Bale along with her team of researchers studied behavioral and hormonal changes in mice, when exposed to crash dieting.

After three weeks, researchers found that mice fed on fewer calories ended up losing 10-15 percent of their body weight, which is close to what humans lose in similar conditions.

Researchers also found that during this period, mice not just started displaying depression-like behavior but the level of stress hormone called corticosterone in them also increased.

Numerous genes responsible for keeping stress and eating patterns under control had also changed in the dieting mice, the study authors wrote.

Even when these mice were allowed to return to their normal weight, the epigenetic changes (occurred during dieting period) remained as such.

Afterwards, researchers also put these mice in stressful situations to note how they will react, and they were surprised to find that mice on strict dieting regime ate more fatty food than those who were not part of the weight-loss program.

Curb harmful dieting habits--experts
Study researchers stated in the report that people should understand the harmful after-effects of crash dieting and should stay away from this practice of starving themselves.

They also revealed that by putting end to their dieting habits, people can lower their risk of suffering from diseases like diabetes.

The new study findings appear in the Dec. 1 issue of 'The Journal of Neuroscience.'