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But unfortunately, our bodies keep an accurate log whether or not we write it down, so the end result is frustration: people honestly believe that they’re eating only 1200 calories per day, and get angry and discouraged when they still can’t lose weight, not realizing that they’re actually eating 2500+! 9. We tend to tell researchers – and Cronometer, and FitDay, and SparkPeople – what we think we should be eating, not what we actually eat. To put it very simply, very few people are accurate calorie-counters.

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So chances are very good that even if you think this doesn’t apply to you, it does (this study isn’t free full-text, but there’s a great detailed analysis here if you want the details).

And these were women who were trained by experts and knew they were being evaluated based on how accurate their records were. They had all the women keep food logs, but also used very accurate metabolic techniques to measure how many calories they were really eating.Īlmost all the women were severely overestimating their energy intake – one of them thought she was eating 1100 calories and was actually eating over 3000! On average, they were underestimating by around 50%.

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Researchers took women who claimed they couldn’t lose weight on a 1,200 calorie diet, and trained them how to track their calorie intake. The more overweight you are, the worse you’re likely to be at calorie reporting: in this study, obese subjects underreported calories by 47% on average (on top of overreporting physical activity).

So if the average person thinks she’s eating 1500 calories, she’s probably closer to 2100. The typical underestimation is 10-45%, with an average of 30%. It’s a very well-known problem for diet researchers that people are absolutely terrible at estimating how many calories they eat – and the more overweight they are, the worse they’re likely to be at it. This week, take a look at the top 10 reasons why calorie-counting doesn’t help, and what to do instead. The short version: yes, technically, they “count,” but that doesn’t make counting calories a useful plan for weight loss. Last week’s article on whether calories count took on the problem of calories in general.

Fitday carb counter