Now that I have got your attention, I am sorry, but the answer is no, eating chocolate will not give you that perfect summer body. And, I hate to break it to you, but you know all those easy and great health and weight loss tips you read in a magazine or online? Well, they are probably not going to work either.
As a college student surrounded by ramen and free pizza and donuts, it is already hard enough to eat a healthy diet without confusing, and often false, advertisements telling me what is or isn’t good for me. I work hard to live a healthy lifestyle and eat nutritiously, so I am constantly struggling with knowing who or what to trust. It is unrealistic that I, or any average person who wants to eat healthy, is going to be able to do all of the scientific research on their own to know what is best for them. Advertisers only make this harder with posts like, “Chocolate is Good For You!,” when really only a small amount of dark chocolate that has a specific percentage of cacao or higher and has very little sugar is what is good for you (well I think it is..).
A peer of mine recently posted on her blog, Just Add Reason, about the issue of not knowing who to trust and reiterated the fact that advertisers often deceive you. In her post, titled, Food or Toxic Drug – Honestly, How Are We to Know Better?, she questions the general publics ability to argue against the white coat:
“It isn’t new that advertising fires ridiculous amounts of health messages at us. What’s good for you? What’s not? We are well aware of how they can skew nutrition label information left and right to convince us to buy their product. Unfortunately, the general public, more often than not, succumbs to these fallacies. But honestly, how are you supposed to be an expert in nutrition if you haven’t spent your life with your nose in a medical journal? Truth be told, our ignorance or naivety when it comes to the nutrition label is to be expected. We are pleasantly preoccupied with goals other than mastering the nutrition checklist and staying current on the recent macronutrient verdicts. When looking for answers we turn to those qualified and of merit in the field – of course. Though we, as a general public, always run the risk of receiving unreliable or misleading information, what gives us the confidence to argue against the expert in the white lab coat?”
Of course, with the internet, just about anyone can post just about anything, but what concerns me, is how professionals (doctors, scientists, nutritionists) are advertising these fad diets and bogus health tips and how it is so easy for them to do so. So, I decided to do a little research on how the ‘chocolate as a weight loss tool’ fad all started.
Science journalist John Bohannon, who is not only one of the people responsible for spreading the fad, but also debunking it. He has a Ph.D. in molecular biology and works as a journalist. Bohannon explains how the chocolate story started. He and a group of documentary filmmakers teamed up to prove “just how easy it is to turn bad science into big headlines.” They made a group and a website which they titled the Institute of Diet and Health. With their made up group, they recruited a doctor, an analyst, and paid research subjects to take part in a clinical trial in which they tested the effects of eating chocolate.
Although both Bohannon and the Doctor’s goal was to blast pseudoscience in the diet industry, they ran a real clinical trial to do so. One-third of the subjects were randomly put on a low-carb diet, and one-third were assigned to eat a 1.5-ounce bar of dark chocolate every day in addition to the same low-carb diet. The other third was the control group; they were instructed to keep up with their normal diets. After 21 days, the analyst crunched the numbers and found that the chocolate-eating group lost weight about 10 percent faster than the other dieters.
Wait.. so the study showed that chocolate did lead to weight loss..so we should trust it, right? Bohannon explains why we shouldn’t and that the experiment was basically rigged:
“Here’s a dirty little science secret: If you measure a large number of things about a small number of people, you are almost guaranteed to get a ‘statistically significant’ result. Our study included 18 different measurements — weight, cholesterol, sodium, blood protein levels, sleep quality, well-being, etc. — from 15 people. (One subject was dropped.) That study design is a recipe for false positives….We didn’t know exactly what would pan out — the headline could have been that chocolate improves sleep or lowers blood pressure — but we knew our chances of getting at least one ‘statistically significant’ result were pretty good.”
Now that they had a report that showed a result which they liked, all they needed was a publisher. They found one, who did not fact check them at all, published their work, and paid them.
So basically, doctors and researchers are able to create the results that benefit them the most and have the biggest headline in order to make some extra cash. My own moral issues with this aside, the main point is that you should not trust any catchy weight loss or health tool headline. My advice, is that you should just try to keep your diet balanced and listen to your body. There is no one size fits all diet. If something sounds good, eat it; if you know something makes you feel sick later, avoid it; and if you are craving something “bad,” don’t make it off limits, just have a small amount.
Polka Dots & Politics 
I could not agree more with the postings of your blog! The question remains: How do we know what is good for us and what is not good for us to eat? One can tell us to look at the food labels, but, as mentioned, most of the time ingredients and facts about the food are dismissed and the processes in which the food is made is not disclosed. I don’t think there is a single solution to the food crisis we face, but there should be an idea of how to approach the topic. I agree with your motto that there is not a one size fits all notion in nutrition. However, that too takes control form self and trust from food producers. Hopefully, one day, we find a way to take money and politics out of health and nutrition.
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It’s frightening, isn’t it? Because the vast majority of people do latch onto headlines as sound diet advice. I myself, have fallen victim to it. And it’s not surprising why. If you tell an audience their guilty pleasures (chocolate, wine, etc.) are actually good for them, of course they would stand behind it and then disseminate it among their social circles, thus spreading the lie. Our society is increasingly one where we want our beliefs to be affirmed, not challenged.
What also troubles me is, as you note in your article, how easy it seems to have a scientific study published. How many other “studies” has the nation digested as fact when in reality their startlingly inaccurate? Perhaps this is something you could pursue.
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I think it’s really important to keep track of what foods you allow into your body. I was surprised to read that doctors control the results of their studies. This makes it difficult for the consumer because we want to trust our credible sources (doctors), but ultimately we are responsible for reading as much as we can in order to make the most educated decision for our own bodies. In your last paragraph, you mentioned that there’s no one size fits all diet. I completely agree. This made me think of the common myth run by the media that the only to properly diet is to see a nutritionist and have him/her custom-design a diet for you. These programs are costly and often inaccurate, making it hard to reach certain weight loss goals. I think that everything suggested in these phony research studies and diet fads are a way to continue trends and milk the economy. Knowing this, I feel like the only solution for those looking to lose weight is to practice self-control.
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