Don't believe the hype: understanding fad-diet fallacies

If you've known anyone trying to lose weight or eat more healthfully, you've likely heard at least one friend, family member, or coworker talk about their experiences with Atkins, the South Beach Diet, Paleo, or any number of fad diets. The buzz surrounding these popular programs can make even the most sensible eater a little curious.

While many fad diets are popular, few people are able to achieve and maintain a healthy weight following them. How can that be?

Simple: Rather than helping people understand and adopt a lifelong approach of balancing caloric intake with calories burned, fad diets often give people excuses to eat insensibly. This may hinder their attempts to make permanent, healthy changes to their diets and lifestyles.

How to understand the promises and perils of diets

Occasionally, there are a few valuable lessons hidden in some of these elaborate diet plans. But you often need to sift through misinformation and oversimplification to get to the practical, healthful nutrition advice. So, when it comes to fad diets, here are two simple ways to alleviate confusion:

Beware of misleading buzzwords

Once the buzz about the latest diet trend begins, marketers latch on to certain key words and product points that appeal to people who are watching their weight. Then, the food industry responds by focusing on words and claims that suggest their products can help dieters follow a particular diet plan. These buzzwords are often misleading, allowing the manufacturers to capitalize not only on consumers' curiosity but also on their lack of certainty about nutrition labeling.

Take, for example, one of the buzz phrases in low-carb dieting: "net carbs." Dozens of products claim to have low "net carbs" or low "impact carbs." Both of these terms sound technical. But the truth is that they were created by the diet and food industry. They have not been evaluated, approved, or regulated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

If it's not a government-approved labeling method, there's no way to evaluate what the term means or whether it's benefiting your health.

Furthermore, "net carb" terminology does not generally provide an accurate estimate of total carbohydrate content. The FDA calculates total carbohydrates by subtracting grams of protein, fat, water, and a substance called ash from the total weight of the food. This number is listed on the food label as total carbohydrates.

Diet-food manufacturers often calculate "net carbs" by taking total carbohydrates and subtracting fiber, glycerin, and sugar alcohols, all of which are forms of carbohydrates. This gives the appearance of reduced amounts of carbohydrates in their products and suggests that the products don't raise blood sugar, even though they may.

Unfortunately, the use of such labeling has expanded to hundreds of other foods and may lead you to believe you are consuming fewer carbs and calories than you actually are.

Knowing what to look for on food labels can help you avoid being duped.

Cutting back on processed carbs is certainly healthy advice. Processed carbs may include drinks that contain added sugars or fructose, and foods such as cookies, cakes, breads, and pasta made from refined flour. But encouraging consumers to buy processed and packaged products that claim to be "carb smart" when they actually hide their carbs is not.

Here are some other product terms and buzzwords to be wary of: quick, fast, slim, trim, lean, lite, natural, fat replacers, meal replacement, breakthrough, and revolutionary.

Question sweeping generalizations

As a diet gains popularity, the specifics often get boiled down to blanket statements or sound bites, such as "Carbohydrates make you fat." As a result, these diets turn into nothing more than an exaggeration of one facet of nutrition at the expense of another. Moderation and balance are lost and the followers of the diet usually fail to lose weight over the long term.

For instance, during the fat-free craze, people turned to no-fat and low-fat foods that were high in carbohydrates, which led to overconsumption of nutrient-poor, refined carbs. Then, many popular diets did a complete reversal and told people to replace carbohydrates with foods high in protein, fat, and cholesterol. When food groups become so polarized, it's easy to lose perspective on what a balanced diet looks like. And that's bad for your health.

As a general rule, removing entire food groups or severely limiting food variety is unwise and may be harmful to your health.

To function, your body requires a balance of the nutrients found in vegetables, fruit, whole grains, dairy, lean proteins, and unsaturated fats. The total fat or carbohydrate content of your diet needn't be severely restricted, provided that the sources of each are the right ones and that you continue to maintain an optimal balance of caloric intake and expenditure. That means:

Don't be afraid of fats

Just be sure most of the fat you eat is healthy unsaturated fat to help protect your heart and arteries. Olive or canola oil, and fats from nuts or oily fish, are better than hydrogenated vegetable oils, or saturated fats found in red meats, butter, or lard.

Keep the carbs coming

Carbs are a major energy source in the human diet. You need them. Choose unrefined whole grains, such as whole-wheat bread, whole-wheat pasta, and fresh vegetables and fruit as your major source of carbs.

Other generalizations that don't hold up to scrutiny:

• Claims that one particular food, such as grapefruit or cabbage, is the answer to weight loss
• Assertions that when—or in what order—you eat certain foods can aid in weight loss

Look for a lifestyle and stick to the basics

It's easy to get lured in by the hype of the hottest new diet, especially when it's all over the internet or in stores. But keep in mind that your weight is a key component of your overall health, so don't subject your health to a trend. A healthy diet is not a regimen that changes with the seasons. Instead, it's a way of life. If you're confused by a diet plan, or it's difficult to manage, chances are that it's not the answer to long-lasting weight management.

It may sound too easy to be true, but the most effective recommendations for people who want to lose weight and keep it off are to eat a balanced diet, exercise, and monitor calories. Follow these simple pointers:

• Eat a little protein at every meal.
• Cut back on refined grains and sugars.
• Enjoy reasonably sized portions.
• Diversify: Enjoy a few items from each food group every day.
• Opt for fresh rather than packaged foods.