WASHINGTON — The holidays can be a big diet buster, or at least that’s the popular belief. However, the truth about holiday weight gain may be very different.
Nutrition expert Travis Saunders takes on what he considers a holiday myth in his PLOS blog. He says that while most of us believe the average adult gains between 5 and 10 pounds over the holidays, the real number is much lower.
A dig through the scientific literature turns up a study in the New England Journal of Medicine that backs up his point.
Researchers followed 195 adults who periodically recorded their weight over the course of a year. Their average weight gain from mid-November to mid-January was a little under a pound.
But there’s still a problem: Researchers said the pounds tended to stick around and were not lost during the year.
That means that after 10 years, an adult could end up with an extra 10 pounds of seasonal weight — contributing to that mid-life spare tire so many people fear.
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