- Can dieting make us gain weight?
Can our thoughts?
How connected are the mind and body?
Let's talk eating and psychology.
(upbeat music)
Hey, welcome to the series, I'm Alyssia
and I'm so glad you're here.
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Okay, in this entire series
we have talked a lot about the mind-body connection.
We've talked about inner and outer wisdom.
If you don't know what I'm talking about
watch all those videos first.
But what I really wanna get at in this series is that
we've got to heal from the inside out.
We have to recognize that emotional, mental
and physical health are all connected.
Remember that triangle.
We talked about stress as a connector of the mind-body
and the new field of science that's emerging,
psychoneuroimmunology.
- [Female Voiceover] Psychoneuroimmunology.
- Which studies the connection between the brain
and the immune system.
And when I was doing research in grad school,
I came across some studies,
learning about how our mind and our perception of food
can actually affect our choices,
not only about how much we eat,
but also maybe how we metabolize the food.
- [Voiceover] Say what?
- So I have got three studies
that I wanna tell you about today.
The first two are about dieting and dysregulation.
If you don't remember what dysregulation is
go back and watch that video.
The first study is all about
Pudding.
So there are two puddings.
One is a high calorie pudding.
One is a low calorie pudding.
There's a group of people given the high calorie pudding
half of them are told it's high,
half of them are told it's low,
even though it's high.
In the group that's given the low calorie pudding,
half of them are told it's high
and half of them are told it's low,
even though it's low, okay?
So pretty much in both groups,
half are being told it's high and low
even though only one group is eating the high
and one group is eating the low.
Okay, so they specifically looked at dieters
which were tagged as you know,
people who restricted food and tried to lose weight
and non dieters.
Remember we talked about earlier in the series
dieting is a form of dysregulation
where we tune out and we turn off the feedback loops.
So in the study, the dieters who thought
that the pudding, who were told the pudding
was high calorie,
they ate 61% more than the dieters
who thought it was low in calories.
Okay, it didn't matter if it actually was or not.
It was just what they thought.
So this is an example of that pendulum.
When with dieting, when we restrict
it makes us physiologically
and mentally hungry
and that's gonna lead to binging.
People who diet,
and I know I felt this for years,
the all or nothing mentality,
you know, if it's there in front of me,
I'm gonna eat it.
I'm gonna say screw it
and it's a terrible cycle.
This study is mentioned in the "Intuitive Eating" book.
And I talked about intuitive eating yesterday.
Okay, the second and third studies.
(gentle music)
The second and third studies involve milkshakes, okay?
So women were given one, two or zero milkshakes, okay?
Now once completed
they were asked to taste test and rate
three different,
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three different.
So they were asked to taste test
three different flavor of ice cream
after eating one, two or zero milkshakes, okay?
And they were told that
they could taste test the ice cream in private.
So that way they could eat as much as they wanted.
Now, again,
the non dieters regulated they're eating naturally.
So they adjusted the amount of ice cream that they ate
in private during the taste test,
based on how many milkshakes
they had already had, okay?
So if they ate, if they had a taste tested
you know, two milkshakes,
they ate less ice cream.
If they didn't taste test any milkshakes
they had more ice cream.
With the dieters,
it had the opposite effect.
So those who drank two milkshakes that were dieters
also ate the most ice cream, okay?
So restriction from dieting,
the point of this, the restriction from dieting
leads to the I've-blown-it effect, okay?
That's what they really call it in the research.
So when we feel we've ruined our diet,
we spring from one extreme of, limitation of restriction
to the binge.
This is the yo-yoing
and our bodies really don't fare well with it.
This does not make a great case for dieting.
When I found this stuff out,
I had to really consider was dieting working for me
or was I in this cycle?
You know, over and over
never really able to escape.
Does that mean that I think dieting is bad?
I mean, it depends.
I am gonna talk about this later in the week.
Again, I think dieting can be a tool,
but is it a tool that really works?
Okay, so one more study.
The most fascinating of all
and it's also about milkshakes.
Okay, this study was actually called
"Mind Over Milkshakes" on the published paper.
And when I found it, I was so giddy.
So this study was done at Yale university
with Peter Salovey
and he is one of the pioneer researchers
of emotional intelligence,
which we talked a lot about earlier in the series.
So the study measured whether physiological satiation,
so if we were actually, you know,
satisfied in our body
was affected by mindset regarding food consumption.
So let me explain the study to you.
So people consumed a milkshake that it was,
it actually in real life, 380 calories,
but people were told it was either indulgent
and that it was 620 calories
or they were told it was sensible
and it was 140 calories, okay?
So remember this was the actual amount of calories
but they were told it was either high or low
and it's actually not accurate
to draw milkshake like this
because in the real study
they have like the,
it was almost like a slim fast shake or something,
you know, in like the packages
that you can buy at the store.
So it had a real nutrition label with the calories.
It was very deceiving.
So what they did is they took people.
They gave them the shakes,
told them, you know,
either you have an indulgent shake
or a sensible shake,
they measured their ghrelin levels
which is a hunger hormone.
And it's an indicator of energy insufficiency.
Essentially, it stimulates your appetite.
So when the stomach is empty
ghrelin is secreted to let you know,
you know, I'm hungry.
And when nutrients are then detected
once you eat the brain signals to reduce the appetite
because now you've eaten and you don't feel as hungry.
So here's what the study showed.
The mindset of indulgence
produced a dramatically steeper decline and ghrelin
and after consuming the shake,
the mindset of the sensible shake
produced a relatively flat ghrelin response.
Essentially, that's quoted from the article,
but essentially satiety for the individuals
was consistent with what they believed they were consuming
not the nutritional value.
What does this mean?
Our thoughts can,
what we think we're consuming
can impact, not only our eating behavior,
so how much we eat, right?
Like the puddings thing where they ate 61% more,
but also our physiology, okay?
So this means it could affect how we metabolize the food.
The implications here are huge.
Can our thoughts affect our metabolism or our weight?
If there's a chance that the way we think about food
affects how we metabolize it.
And you know, we know stress affects
how we hold onto visceral fat and retain nutrients.
We know that stress hormones affect our physiology,
we really need to learn more about this.
Now, this is what I actually realized,
once I started coming across all of this research,
it really means all this focus on outer wisdom on nutrition
in some ways is, a waste of time.
Now I am a fan of science
and I'm a fan of outer wisdom.
And I believe the strongest case we have
to make peace with food
is using both with the foundation of inner wisdom.
The truth is right now,
we don't know as much about nutrition
as we think we know.
Most studies looking at specific diets
have not even been around for a full lifetime.
I mean, think about it,
how can we know the long-term effects?
We can't.
That doesn't mean don't listen to science
but it means listen in a discerning way,
you know, where you determine what resonates.
And it means
getting caught up in the details of macronutrients
and even micronutrients and calories
can add a stress, which we know
adding stress doesn't do anything good,
and at the same time, we have no idea really
how our thoughts are affecting our nutrition
which is totally possible,
because of the mind-body connection.
Now I'm gonna talk about how much nutrition
really matters for weight loss later this week.
But the point here is the mind and body are connected.
And this is one thing
I'm going to continue to,
kind of preach on the channel.
I'm not preachy.
I want you to decide for you
but if you don't think the mind and body are connected
you're not gonna hear anything I'm saying here
because it's what I believe.
Okay, so share in the comments,
you know, what do you think about the mind body connection?
What do you believe?
What have you seen for yourself?
What are you skeptical about?
If you think anyone would find this video interesting,
please share it with them.
And remember, I'm gonna actually link these studies
in the materials, in the course email for today.
Okay, that's it for now.
I'll be back tomorrow with more,
but just remember it's all a matter of Mind Over Munch,
but really Mind Over Milkshakes.
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