Diet composition, energy intake, and nutritional status in relation to obesity in men and women.

There are dietary factors besides the total energy value of food that can affect adiposity by disrupting the balance between energy intake and expenditure. The purpose of this paper was to examine how perturbation of these dietary factors that control energy balance affects adiposity. There is a substantial amount of evidence suggesting that obesity is not associated with overeating, but with a high dietary fat-to-carbohydrate intake ratio. Physiological adaptations to energy-reduced dieting facilitate both weight regain and make it more difficult to lose weight during subsequent dieting attempts. Since obesity may be better characterized by diet composition than by energy intake, successful weight-loss programs should include diet compositional changes in their regimes.