Can eating snacks help you lose weight? The premise is that you have to do these 4 things!

Snacks include not only fruits, nuts and potato chips, but also any food or drink that contains energy outside of meals. For example, tea without any additives is not a snack, but milk tea is a snack.

More and more people are eating snacks, not just to stave off hunger, but also for the sake of deliciousness, weight loss, or to kill time [1, 2]. There are more and more types of snacks to choose from, so what should we eat?

01

Is there a healthiest snack?

For healthy people, the healthiest all-day diet plan exists. Currently, following the "Dietary Guidelines for Chinese Residents (2022)" can meet the health needs of most people.

However, dietary requirements vary greatly at different stages of life, such as infancy, childhood, adolescence, pregnancy, lactation, and old age.[3] Disease conditions also have an impact on diet. For example, hypertension, diabetes, and dyslipidemia all have their own dietary requirements.

As part of a full-day diet, the healthiness of snacks depends on their consistency with dietary guidelines[4]. Therefore, the demand for snacks varies depending on the stage of life, health status and the content of regular meals .

Therefore, there is no standard snacking frequency, time and type that is suitable for everyone. However, you can find the most suitable healthy snacks for yourself according to your personal situation.

Copyright image, no permission to reprint

02

How do I choose the best snack for me?

First, compare your current meals with the dietary guidelines. If you find that some ingredients are lacking, you can use snacks to make up for them . Most people do not have enough fiber in their meals, so vegetables and fruits are excellent snacks. For those who eat less fish, poultry, eggs, meat, and milk for their meals, choose protein-rich snacks.

While supplementing the missing nutrients, we must also avoid excessive intake . Most people already have a lot of energy and salt in their main meals, so they can only choose snacks with low energy and avoid high-salt ones. In addition, added sugar and fat in the diet mainly come from snacks. Even if you only eat salad for the main meal, the amount of added sugar and fat after a few cups of milk tea will still exceed the standard[5].

Copyright image, no permission to reprint

In addition to balancing nutrients, a diet high in sugar should be minimized to prevent dental caries[6].

When choosing snacks for infants and young children, special attention should be paid to avoiding those that may cause choking (such as grapes, nuts, and jelly), and also consider their growth and development needs[6].

When there are special needs, choose snacks according to the specific situation. For example, people with anemia can supplement snacks rich in heme iron, people with hypertension and heart disease can avoid high-salt snacks, and people with diabetes can avoid high-sugar snacks. Adjust the type of snacks according to weight goals, and eat appropriately in advance to ensure exercise status. [6] Comorbidities are not a reason to prohibit snacks. Increasing the frequency of meals is beneficial to improving blood pressure and blood lipids. [7]

Copyright image, no permission to reprint

03

Does eating snacks make you fat or lose weight?

In addition to whether they are delicious and healthy, the impact of snacks on body weight is probably the most concerned aspect. In fact, the relationship between snacking and body weight is not necessarily true. Some people gain weight by eating snacks, while others lose weight the more they eat. This depends not only on the frequency, time, ingredients, and whether they are solid or liquid, but also on the people, occasions, and state of eating together [4, 8, 9].

Snacks are an important part of a healthy diet for people who do not consume enough energy from regular meals, are deficient in certain nutrients, or are underweight.[8, 10] Food that cannot be eaten at regular meals can be spread out over the course of the day to supplement a variety of nutrients as much as possible.

If the main meals already contain enough or even too much energy, and then add snacks (especially those high in sugar and fat), weight control will naturally be difficult.

04

If you eat the wrong food, you will gain weight

1. Inappropriate ingredients and form

In addition to the total amount, the most important factors affecting the relationship between snacks and body weight are energy and nutrition. The higher the energy content of a certain weight of snacks, the fewer beneficial nutrients they contain, and the more likely they are to make people gain weight [4, 11, 12]. The most influential are sugar-added beverages such as cola and milk tea, followed by high-sugar and high-fat desserts, biscuits, potato chips and fried foods.

Fresh fruits can be eaten whole as a good snack, but squeezing them into juice can cause weight gain due to rapid sugar absorption and low satiety [3, 13].

Copyright image, no permission to reprint

2. Not hungry, just want to eat

Do you snack because you’re hungry or just bored? When people feel hungry, they are more likely to choose healthy snacks, but when they are not hungry, they are more likely to choose high-fat, high-sugar, and high-salt snacks [7, 14]. Snacking to pass the time is more likely to cause weight gain and lead to nutritional imbalance.

3. Inappropriate scene

Most people choose healthier snacks at home or at work, but tend to overeat and choose foods that make them gain weight when they are outside.[7] For example, when watching a TV series at home, you may eat an apple as a snack, but when you go to the cinema to watch a movie, you will inevitably buy a bucket of popcorn.

As we all know, it is easy to eat too much at a buffet with a wide variety of food. The same is true for snacks. Generally, the more variety there is to choose from, the more you eat. Therefore, you need to be extra careful when eating snacks when you are out, especially when you are faced with a variety of different snacks[4].

4. Not eating with enough concentration

If you are not paying attention to the food when you eat, but are watching TV shows or playing games while eating, you will not only be more likely to overeat at that time, but also eat more at the next meal[4]. And the more boring the snacks you focus on, the more you eat, so not choosing the right TV shows may also be one of the reasons why you can't lose weight[7].

5. Use snacks to relieve stress

When people are in a bad mood or under great psychological pressure, they tend to prefer snacks with high energy, sugar and fat content, especially women [4, 15]. If you don’t control yourself, you may feel better after eating, but regret the fat on your body later.

Copyright image, no permission to reprint

In addition, studies have found that the amount of snacking you eat is influenced by your peers . If you see your friends eating a lot, you will unconsciously eat more. Even if you eat alone, clues such as the size of the package left by others will influence your choice[7].

Another common saying is that "eating snacks at night makes you fat." It is true that most people who eat snacks at night are fatter than those who eat during the day, but the time of day is not the most important factor. Rather, people are more willing to choose fruits and vegetables as snacks during the day, and prefer high-energy snacks at night. They also eat while doing other things, which leads to eating more [16].

05

There are also tips for eating snacks to lose weight

Except for laxatives, most things will not make you lose weight the more you eat. The following recommendations are about how to avoid excessive energy intake and how to be less hungry when losing weight. If you don't have the habit of snacking, and your main meals are nutritious and you don't feel hungry when losing weight, there is no need to force yourself to add snacks.

1. Fiber provides a strong sense of fullness

The higher the fiber content of a snack, the greater the feeling of fullness, and the greater the effect of reducing the amount of food eaten at the next meal. Fresh fruits and vegetables are rich in fiber and low in calories, making them suitable for filling the stomach when hungry (fruits with very high fat and sugar content, such as durian, avocado and dates, should only be eaten in small amounts) [3].

Copyright image, no permission to reprint

Staple foods can also be used as snacks. Eating foods made from whole grains (such as oats) will make you less likely to feel hungry than eating refined rice and flour (such as white bread) [4].

2. High-protein snacks are beneficial

Would eating a piece of jerky make you less hungry than a drink or ice cream with the same energy level? Compared with snacks high in carbohydrates or fat, high-protein snacks have the strongest satiety effect [4, 17]. Moreover, after eating high-protein snacks, it is easier to resist the temptation of high-sugar and high-fat foods, and it may even improve cognitive function [18].

When losing weight, you can choose dairy products (yogurt and milk without added sugar, etc.; if the daily consumption is large, choose skimmed or low-fat dairy products) and nuts (salt-free) as snacks.

3. Snack frequency, timing and amount suitable for most people

For most people, it is appropriate to eat snacks 2 to 3 times a day, preferably when hungry. The total energy of snacks should account for 5% to 15% of the total daily diet[6]. This is roughly equivalent to an adult eating a medium-sized apple, a small cup of unsweetened yogurt (100 to 150 grams), and two plain walnuts every day.

Copyright image, no permission to reprint

4. Select Start from Purchase

Try to go shopping when you are full to avoid buying fattening snacks when you are hungry. Also, always have some low-energy snacks on hand and keep them in easy-to-reach places[4]. For pre-packaged snacks, try to choose smaller portions[4]. Once you have opened a delicious snack, who would stop eating halfway through?

Finally, there is another way to lose weight and feel full at the same time - drink more water [19]. This is a clear and effective method and the easiest to implement, but you should drink water without energy . Coke, milk tea, and coffee with sugar and milk are all snacks, not water!

References:

[1] Wang D, van der Horst K, Jacquier EF, et al. Snacking Patterns in Children: A Comparison between Australia, China, Mexico, and the US. Nutrients. 2018;10(2).

[2] Wang Z, Zhai F, Zhang B, et al. Trends in Chinese snacking behaviors and patterns and the social-demographic role between 1991 and 2009. Asia Pac J Clin Nutr. 2012;21(2):253-262.

[3] Chinese Nutrition Society. Dietary Guidelines for Chinese Residents (2016). Beijing: People's Medical Publishing House, 2016.

[4] Njike VY, Smith TM, Shuval O, et al. Snack Food, Satiety, and Weight. Adv Nutr. 2016;7(5):866-878.

[5] USDA. Scientific Report of the 2015 Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee. 2015.

[6]Potter M, Vlassopoulos A, Lehmann U. Snacking Recommendations Worldwide: A Scoping Review. Adv Nutr. 2018;9(2):86-98.

[7] Hess JM, Jonnalagadda SS, Slavin JL. What Is a Snack, Why Do We Snack, and How Can We Choose Better Snacks? A Review of the Definitions of Snacking, Motivations to Snack, Contributions to Dietary Intake, and Recommendations for Improvement. Adv Nutr. 2016;7(3):466-475.

[8] Zizza CA. Healthy snacking recommendations: one size does not fit all. Physiol Behav. 2014;134:32-37.

[9] Keast DR, Nicklas TA, O'Neil CE. Snacking is associated with reduced risk of overweight and reduced abdominal obesity in adolescents: National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) 1999-2004. Am J Clin Nutr. 2010;92(2):428-435.

[10] Taillie LS, Wang D, Popkin BM. Snacking Is Longitudinally Associated with Declines in Body Mass Index z Scores for Overweight Children, but Increases for Underweight Children. J Nutr. 2016;146(6):1268-1275.

[11] Tripicchio GL, Kachurak A, Davey A, et al. Associations between Snacking and Weight Status among Adolescents 12-19 Years in the United States. Nutrients. 2019;11(7).

[12] Larson NI, Miller JM, Watts AW, et al. Adolescent Snacking Behaviors Are Associated with Dietary Intake and Weight Status. J Nutr. 2016;146(7):1348-1355.

[13] van Eekelen E, Geelen A, Alssema M, et al. Sweet Snacks Are Positively and Fruits and Vegetables Are Negatively Associated with Visceral or Liver Fat Content in Middle-Aged Men and Women. J Nutr. 2019;149(2):304-313.

[14] Marmonier C, Chapelot D, Fantino M, et al. Snacks consumed in a nonhungry state have poor satiating efficiency: influence of snack composition on substrate utilization and hunger. Am J Clin Nutr. 2002;76(3):518-528.

[15] Camilleri GM, Méjean C, Kesse-Guyot E, et al. The associations between emotional eating and consumption of energy-dense snack foods are modified by sex and depressive symptomatology. J Nutr. 2014;144(8):1264-1273.

[16] Barrington WE, Beresford SAA. Eating Occasions, Obesity and Related Behaviors in Working Adults: Does it Matter When You Snack? Nutrients. 2019;11(10).

[17] Astbury NM, Taylor MA, French SJ, et al. Snacks containing whey protein and polydextrose induce a sustained reduction in daily energy intake over 2 wk under free-living conditions. Am J Clin Nutr. 2014;99(5):1131-1140.

[18] Leidy HJ, Todd CB, Zino AZ, et al. Consuming High-Protein Soy Snacks Affects Appetite Control, Satiety, and Diet Quality in Young People and Influences Select Aspects of Mood and Cognition. J Nutr. 2015;145(7):1614-1622.

[19] Stookey JD, Constant F, Popkin BM, Gardner CD. Drinking water is associated with weight loss in overweight dieting women independent of diet and activity. Obesity (Silver Spring). 2008;16(11):2481-2488.

Author: Dai Tianyi, former attending physician of the Department of Cardiology at Beijing Anzhen Hospital

Source: Guokr

The cover image and the images in this article are from the copyright library

Reproduction of image content is not authorized