TEDxCampos - Deborah Kesten - Por que comemos demais

Notas del editor

1. I am a nutrition researcher. I am a health writer and author. And I specialize in preventing and reversing obesity and heart disease. I am here to talk about a global health catastrophe that is a greater threat than terrorism, greater than our financial crisis, and even global warming. And that threat is WORLDWIDE OBESITY. Why is obesity such a huge threat? Because it leads to life-threatening conditions such as heart disease, diabetes, some cancers—and more. While it’s true that the key ways to lose weight is to eat less and exercise more, there are other more complex—and remarkable reasons. For instance, researchers have recently discovered that synthetic chemicals in food and beverages, and lack of sleep, can lead to weight gain and obesity. Today, I’m going to tell you a story about previously unknown secrets for weight loss success. Most of them have been secrets until our research revealed them.
2. Today, the United States is the world leader in rates of obesity. As you can see in the darker blue sections, in 1990, less than 14% of the adult population was obese.
3. 10 years later, in 2000, the states in the tan color show that 20–24% of the population had become obese.
4. By 2010, most of the states had an obesity rate of 20%-30%. This means that in the U.S., obesity has doubled in the last 20 years!!!
5. Not only has the obesity rate doubled; the number of overweight Americans—of all ages—has dramatically increased. Today, 68% of adults—men and women over 18 years old, are overweight or obese. One-third of children & teenagers are overweight or obese. And 32% of infants—6 months old—are OBESE or AT RISK FOR BECOMING OBESE. Is Brazil following this trend?
6. Yes, unfortunately. For example, Brazil’s Ministry of Health reports that 46.6% of Brazilians are now overweight or obese and the percentage of children has tripled—from 4% to 14%--between 1975 and 1997. In response to such statistics, Jose Temporao, Brazil’s Minister of Health said, “We are sitting on top of a time bomb.” He’s not exaggerating: If the current rate of obesity in Brazil continues, the director of the Department of Health Analysis estimates Brazil’s rate of obesity would match that of the US in 2022. Brazil isn’t alone. Most of the world population is becoming overweight and obese. What does such daunting data tell us? Where is the world population heading? From an article by Robin Yapp , Sao Paulo who cited Wang et al. Am J Clin Nutr 2002;75:971–7. Source: The Telegraph , Dec. 15, 2010, Robin Yapp, Sao Paulo
7. Clearly, we need to find a solution to the global obesity crisis!!
8. The best solution is to eat less. Sounds simple, doesn’t it? But it’s not, because if eating less or following a strict diet is the answer, why are only 5% of people who lose weight keep it off? The answer is: they go back to overeating. And the reasons we overeat are far more complex—and remarkable—than we ever imagined. What we’ve discovered is a WEB of interconnected reasons people overeat. And the discovery begins with my nutrition journey around the world, starting in India.
9. While presenting at the First International Conference on Lifestyle and Health in New Delhi, India, I had the honor of interviewing clinical cardiologist Dr. K.L. Chopra, for an article I was planning to write about yoga and diet. Our talk changed my view of food; indeed, my life, forever. When I asked Dr. Chopra about yoga and diet, he quoted the Bagavad Gita , Hindu scripture, which, he said, espouses cooking with love. He told me that prana , or the consciousness with which you prepare food, is infused into the food; in turn, when you eat the food, you “ingest” the consciousness with which the food was made. I couldn’t let go of the thought that “cooking with love” could make a difference in food. But, I thought, if Hinduism, a 3500-year-old religion suggests this is so, would other world religions have something to tell us about food and eating? I decided to find out.
10. To continue my “nutrition journey,” I researched major world religions (examples) , cultural traditions (examples) , and Eastern healing system (examples) for their wisdom about food and eating. After all, these wisdom traditions gave us guidelines for what and how to eat for centuries—for thousands of years before nutritional science became our “guide” well into the 20 th century. The idea to research ancient food wisdom for guidance about optimal eating and weight may seem unusual, but for me, it was familiar territory. This is because, when I was in graduate school, I was the nutritionist on Dr. Dean Ornish’s first clinical trial for reversing heart disease through lifestyle changes alone—without drugs or surgery. The four elements of Dr. Ornish’s program are: diet, stress management, exercise, and social support. What’s relevant to today’s discussion, is that Dr. Ornish’s heart disease reversal program was inspired by the YOGA LIFESTYLE, which has roots going back 5,000 years.
11. As with the yoga lifestyle, many of the religious, cultural, and healing traditions I studied also go back thousands of years. After I gathered all I could, there was so much information, I was overwhelmed. What to do? I turned to my husband, research scientist, Dr. Larry Scherwitz. After lots of brainstorming, we identified six perennial food and eating guidelines that appeared in the wisdom traditions, cultural traditions, and Eastern healing systems.
12. #1 is “eat fresh whole food in its natural state as often as possible.” This means fresh fruits, vegetables, whole grains, beans and peas, and nuts and seeds, and lesser amounts of fresh poultry, meat, fish, and dairy. Today, nutritional science is verifying that fresh whole foods lead to health and healing.
13. #2 is “be aware of feelings before, during, and after eating.” Today, we call this “food-mood research.” The key point is this: science is verifying that food affects our feelings.==and our feelings affect we metabolize our food.
14. The third theme is about mindfulness and bringing moment-to-moment nonjudgmental awareness to every aspect of the meal.
15. Do any of you have memories of giving thanks for food? Perhaps when you were children, eating with your familiy? The fourth guideline tells us to bless food—from the heart.
16. The 5 th theme, which is about cooking with love, brings us back to Dr. Chopra’s comment about the Bagavad Gita , which encourages infusing food with loving prana. The picture is of the Last Supper, which was the start of the Eucharist in Catholicism. At its core, the Eucharist is about infusing the bread and wine with love. .
17. We have discovered that eating with others is more nourishing than eating alone.
18. Larry and I were pleased and amazed to realize the six themes cover all the ways we can relate to food: Biologically, psychologically, spiritually, and socially. When you combine the “Four Facets of Food,” you’re practicing Whole Person Nutrition.
19. I want to tell you about an incredible study that demonstrates the power the four facets of foods could have on your health. The story starts in researcher Robert Nerem’s laboratory in the States, where he was studying the effects of diet on health. What would happen to the arteries of rabbits, he wondered, if he fed them a high-cholesterol diet? To find out, Nerem’s lab assistant fed rabbits kept in cages high-cholesterol bits of rabbit chow. When it was time to tally the results, they were confused because even though all the rabbits were fed the same artery-clogging food, some of them had 60 percent less plaque (blockage) in their arteries. Unable to understand why some rabbits showed early signs of heart disease and others didn’t, Nerem and his team retraced each step of the study. When they did, they discovered the rabbits in the middle tier of cages were the ones who had healthier arteries than those in the lower and higher cages. And the reason why seemed to be that Nerem’s research assistant would take out the rabbits in the middle cages so she could hold, pet, talk to, and play with them as she fed them the high-cholesterol chow. They couldn’t believe what they had found, so they replicated the study and got the same results: the rabbits who were held when fed had little evidence of disease in their arteries. Social environment as a factor in diet-induced atherosclerosis Nerem, R M Levesque, M J Cornhill, J F Science. 1980 Jun 27;208(4451):1475-6. Abstract. Rabbits on a 2 percent cholesterol diet were individually petted, held, talked to, and played with on a regular basis. Measurements of aortic affinity for a Sudan stain, serum cholesterol levels, heart rate, and blood pressure were made at the end of the experimental period. Compared to control groups, which were given the same diet and normal laboratory animal care, the experimental groups showed more than a 60 percent reduction in the percentage of aortic surface area exhibiting sudanophilic lesions, even though serum cholesterol levels, heart rate, and blood pressure were comparable.
20. The more we studied the facets, the more we realized that—like threads in a spider web, each is interconnected. But we still wanted to know: Did they have anything to do with overeating, overweight, and obesity?
21. We got an opportunity to answer this question when the editor at S&H magazine invited me to write an article and create an online e-course about the 6 perennial themes. We would turn this into a research project with a 79-item questionnaire asking people how often their eating behaviors followed the 6 perennial principles.
22. --5,256 people from all over the United States completed the 79-item questionnaire. To make sense of all the eating behaviors in the questionnaire, we focused on two questions: Question #1: Would the 79 eating behaviors in the questionnaire cluster together in a meaningful way that could help us make sense of peoples’ eating behaviors? The answer: Absolutely. The “factor analysis” we did identified 7 distinct styles of eating we call “eating styles.” Which led to question #2: Did the eating styles have anything to do with overeating? The answer: WE WERE AMAZED TO SEE THAT EACH EATING STYLE INDEPENDENTLY AND SIGNIFICANTLY PREDICTED OVEREATING. AND...MOST PREDICTED OVERWEIGHT & OBESITY. IN OTHER WORDS, we had identified seven previously unnknown patterns of eating—problem eating behaviors—that predict overeating and weight gain. We call these “the 7 overeating styles” Here they are:
23. #1. Food Fretting: Dieting and overconcern about the “best” way to eat, or feeling gluttonous, bad, or guilty after overeating
24. The 2 nd overeating style is Task snacking: Eating while working, reading, working, driving, or doing other things
25. I’m sure most of you are familiar with overeating style #3: “Emotional Eating,” or eating for reasons other than a healthy appetite. What’s especially interesting is this: Though all the overeating styles are statistically significant as predictors of overeating, emotional eating is the strongest predictor.
26. #4. Fast Foodism. As consumption of America’s fast food—such as fried chicken, French fries, and super-sweet soda—increases worldwide, so, too, does the weight not only of people in Brazil, but also China, Japan, India, and other countries that are embracing a diet of high-calorie, high-fat, denatured food products.
27. The 5 th overeating style, solo dining, means eating by yourself more often than you dine with others.
28. Overeating style #6, Unpleasant Atmosphere, is a double-edged sword. It applies If you eat in an unpleasant physical environment—such as in your car—or in an unpleasant emotional atmosphere—such as eating while driving in a traffic jam
29. The overeating style of Sensory Disregard is perhaps the most unexpected and overlooked eating style. If you think about it, a closer look at the components of Spiritual Disregard—ignoring the taste and aromas of food; lack of mindfulness and gratitude, in other words—eating with loving regard for food—brings us back to Dr. Chopra’s comment, which started me on my nutrition journey: that cooking and eating with love matters.
30. --With the discovery of 7 overeating styles, we now have a deeper understanding about why it’s so hard to lose weight and keep it off. --First, what is ALARMING about the overeating styles is that each has become the “new normal” for more and more people worldwide. -- Viewed another way, the 7 overeating styles have become our new nutritional deficiencies. --In other words, if you are deficient in any of the four facets of food—biological, psychological, spiritual, and social nutrition—you will compensate by overeating.
31. --The good news is that there’s a lot you can do to turn overeating into optimal eating so you can lose weight and keep it off. --Here are the antidotes to each overeating style: Review each. Thank you for joining me, today, on this nutrition journey around the world. May you all be nourished each time you eat.
32. I am a nutrition researcher. I am a health writer and author. And I specialize in preventing and reversing obesity and heart disease. I am here to talk about a global health catastrophe that is a greater threat than terrorism, greater than our financial crisis, and even global warming. And that threat is WORLDWIDE OBESITY. Why is obesity such a huge threat? Because it leads to life-threatening conditions such as heart disease, diabetes, some cancers—and more. While it’s true that the key ways to lose weight is to eat less and exercise more, there are other more complex—and remarkable reasons. For instance, researchers have recently discovered that synthetic chemicals in food and beverages, and lack of sleep, can lead to weight gain and obesity. Today, I’m going to tell you a story about previously unknown secrets for weight loss success. Most of them have been secrets until our research revealed them.