'No calorie counting, no meal skipping': Study unveils 'cheat-code' for weight loss

Millions of people struggle to stick to traditional diets, often abandoning strict calorie-counting plans in search of quicker, more manageable ways to lose weight.

Nearly everyone around these days wants to lose weight and look fit but very few follow strict or boring diet plans for long term.

To lose weight without actually compromising on favorite food or snacks, researchers had realized that by adopting intermittent fasting people can lose as much weight as calorie restriction, but without the same feeling of constantly controlling their food intake.

According to a new study, people who repeatedly lose weight may find intermittent fasting easier to maintain than traditional calorie counting.

Study found that intermittent fasting and continuous calorie restriction produced similar weight loss results.

Researchers estimated that this increased sense of control accounted for about 15% of their weight loss.

More than 200 adults with obesity took part in the 18-month clinical trial. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three groups: intermittent fasting or continuous calorie restriction.

Those in the intermittent fasting group consumed 30% of their daily energy needs between 8am and 12pm on three nonconsecutive days each week.

After that eating window, they completed a 20 hour fast while on all other days, they ate their usual diet.

Other participants assigned to continuous calorie restriction consumed about 70% of their normal calorie intake each day.

After six months, participants in both the intermittent fasting and calorie restricted groups had lost an average of about 7 kgs of weight.

The study examined not only the difference in weight loss, but also how different dieting approaches affected eating habits, mood, sleep, and overall quality of life.

It comes as participants following the fasting plan did not feel they had to constantly monitor their eating, avoid overeating, or count calories to achieve those results.

People in dieting groups also reported improvements in depression and overall, wellbeing, including on fasting days.

The findings suggest that intermittent fasting and calorie restriction may promote same weight loss through different psychological and behavioral mechanisms.

Participants reported that losing weight required ongoing effort to consciously limit how much they ate and resist overeating.

For a lot of people, intermittent fasting or 'IF' feels like a total “cheat code” compared to traditional diets.

The biggest reason is that it changes "when you eat," not necessarily "what you eat."

As a stark contrast traditional diets often require you, counting calories, weighing food, and tracking macronutrients.

Whereas with IF, the "rule" is usually just a “clock” which means that individuals can eat whatever they want to consume but just within the restricted time frame or eating window.

Although intermittent fasting has grown rapidly in popularity, researchers say much remains unknown about its long term psychological and behavioral effects compared with more traditional dieting strategies.

Importantly, the latest study was conducted by ‘University of Adelaide’ and the study was published in the Journal ‘Clinical Nutrition.’