Where Do Nutrition Myths Come From?
Welcome to my first blog, “Where Do Nutrition Myths Come From?”.
The aim of this short, straightforward and to-the-point blog is to question the source of common nutrition myths.
I want to empower you to be able to make your own decisions and be confident that you have the correct information, so you don’t get mislead into believing rubbish that makes your life harder.
Most myths come from associations – either personal experiences or research associations.
Personal associations
An example of a personal association could be someone who goes on a gluten-free diet and loses weight. They may then believe that gluten was preventing them from losing weight before this diet.
In reality, they likely cut out pastries, breads, pizza, pasta and other tasty, high calorie foods from their diet.
What is more likely is that by removing these foods, they removed a large number of calories from their diet, creating a calorie deficit, which in turn caused the weight loss.
Research associations
Research associations mostly come from correlational studies, looking at the relationship between two things.
However, there are often a lot of other factors outside of the two things being studied that play a big role but aren’t accounted for.
While it may seem a little confusing, correlation (or association) does not equal causation.
A common correlation found in research is that those who have a vegetarian diet are generally healthier.
Research has also found that vegetarians tend to engage in more 'health-seeking' behaviours than non-vegetarians.
In other words, they're also more likely to exercise, less likely to smoke or drink excessively, and they also consume more vegetables (no surprises there!).
Studies that have looked at health-seeking individuals only, and compared vegetarians to non-vegetarians, have found no differences in health outcomes.
So, while a vegetarian diet is likely better than a standard western diet full of processed and junk foods, it is not the cause of 'healthiness'.
Rather, the health-seeking behaviours are what makes these individuals healthier. And choosing a diet full of whole, unprocessed foods including fruits, vegetables and whole grains (regardless of whether their diet contains meat or not) has a big influence on health.
This correlation is statistically significant…but i think we can safely say there are other factors at play!
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