Exercise will eventually stop making you hungry.

Photograph by George Doyle/Getty Images.

When you start a new fitness program, you’re likely to notice that you feel better, sleep more soundly, and eat more. For those of us trying to lose weight, the last item isn’t helpful. That’s because you typically don’t just eat an extra apple or two. You’re so ravenous that you want to gnaw the kitchen counter first thing in the morning and eat every two hours thereafter.

But hark, hope: A new study suggests that if you hang in there long enough, exercise might actually tame your appetite and make it easier to control how much you consume. This could give dieters new reason to stick to fitness resolutions—which the majority give up quickly because of disappointing results.

A team of researchers from Australia, Great Britain, and Sweden monitored the appetites of 58 sedentary overweight and obese adults who participated in supervised exercise sessions designed to burn 500 calories five times a week. At the end of 12 weeks, the subjects predictably reported feeling hungrier upon waking than when they started their exercise regimens. However, their pre-measured breakfasts of cereal, toast, and tea surprisingly made them feel more full than when they ate them at the beginning of the study. More than half even felt less hungry throughout the day.

The study comes with caveats. Some participants were still hungrier than normal overall. They ate more at other meals and didn’t lose as much weight as their peers whose appetites were suppressed. The reason why exercise affected some participants’ appetites differently than others should be studied further. However, the evidence that long-term exercise can help us manage hunger—at the very least by making us more satisfied by food—is a welcome exception to the growing chorus that stepping and squatting won’t help you lose weight. A 2006 review of randomized, controlled trials on the impact of physical activity found that the majority led only to “modest” weight loss, because most people aren’t burning enough calories to move the scale. (Few studies mentioned exercise’s consolation prize: You can replace fat with heavier muscle mass and look better even if you’re not necessarily lighter.)

The basic problem is that it takes only a few squares of focaccia dunked in olive oil to cancel out the 300 calories you burned during a 30-minute session on the elliptical. In fact, it can be so hard to stay inspired that during one 16-month trial, more than half of participants paid to exercise dropped out. Also, alas, the notion that aerobic exercise boosts your metabolism when you’re off the treadmill might be a myth. If all this isn’t enough of an endorphin-kill, another theory holds that exercise makes you so tired that your body retaliates by making you want to do as little as possible for the rest of the day to compensate for the energy you used up in your workout.

Tags: exercise, studies, weight loss

Sarah Elizabeth Richards is the author of Motherhood Rescheduled: Five Women, Five Quests to Stop the Biological Clock to be published in summer 2010. Get the latest by joining the mailing list at www.motherhoodrescheduled.com.

Comments

Matches my experience

By: grackle | Sun, 12/06/2009 - 18:05

So I finally have a media article about a scientific study to back me up. Hooray! ;-)

Exercise has always helped me moderate my eating. I've always chalked it up to improved mood. You need a little bit of optimism to say no to food. You need to believe that you'll reap the benefits eventually. Exercise helps me believe, whether by boosting my mood or just by proving to me that I'm actually the healthy, active person that my darker mind keeps telling me I'm not.

As for exercise making you a bit averse to activity the rest of the day, well, it's true. Just be aware of it and shrug it off. One thing exercise teaches you is that your mind is always telling you lies about the supposedly awful consequences of living life. It's liberating to know the difference between your mind's lies and your body's true needs and capabilities.

Enough speculation, let's open our eyes

By: fsilber | Fri, 12/04/2009 - 12:41

Most ardent jazz dancers have much better figures than women of their own age who are sedentary. I do not believe it is purely a matter of self-selection -- that everyone attracted to dance has a naturally enduring exquisite figure. Nor do I believe that dancers have more will inherent will power than other people. If most of the people with the best-looking bodies (particularly among those well past adolescence) participate in activities that increase strength, flexibility, and endurance, then it seems pretty likely that exercise to increase strength, flexibility and endurance is a gal's best hope for developing a good figure.

I almost never get the

By: littlecynicism | Fri, 12/04/2009 - 12:38

I almost never get the endorphin high that is supposed to keep me addicted to exercise. Instead I often come away feeling depressed, even before I step on the scale and realize that rather than losing weight I'm gaining it, despite my efforts to not change my diet.

I have noticed, though, that when I do a lot of walking (as opposed to tedious trips to the gym) I feel happier *and* I lose weight.

Exercise sucks

By: Janipurr | Fri, 12/04/2009 - 11:56

I have always hated and dreaded forced exercise. Activity is different--I love to ride horses and swim--but give me an exercise routine, and I am fated to hate it so much that I simply won't do it. I even joined Curves and worked out 4 days a week for 3 months in the hope of losing weight, even slowly. Instead, I gained 4 lbs, because I was hungrier all the time. If I can't lose weight exercising unless I do it for a year or more, or some such ridiculous thing, then there is *no chance* that I will be able to tolerate a regular "exercise routine". So, what about the majority of us that have to rely on dieting alone?

Exercise is really a good way

By: XavierM | Fri, 12/04/2009 - 05:19

Exercise is really a good way to form our body in good shape. Aside from that,it helps us to be fit and healthy. According to the article it has many advantages that will help us to avoid some diseases and instead strengthens our immune system an develop a well being and a healthy lifestyle. Recently, a unfortunate news has surprised everybody.The former Miss Argentina beauty Queen Solange Magnano died because of plastic Surgery.She wish to have a firmer butt. It was very ironic and a vanity because the unfortunate incident could be avoid if only she chose to engage in healthy lifestyle, simply by exercising and the proper diet to be fit and healthy. I don't want to judge her actions because maybe she lacks self esteem and confidence. I hope she will become an inspiration and this will serve as lesson to many who are fond of plastic surgery.

Just my two (very long-winded) cents...

By: manyemeralds | Thu, 12/03/2009 - 22:58

"About 90 percent of people on the National Weight Control Registry, which documents the lifestyle habits of people who have lost at least 30 pounds and kept them off for a minimum of three years, claim they exercise about an hour every day."

I'm a member of the National Weight Control Registry, and I happen to be among the 10% that doesn't exercise regularly. I lost 75 lbs and I've kept it off for 5+ years...and I almost never "work out." Sure, I'll go for a hike or play a little tennis here and there, but nothing regimented.

To be honest, and I say this purely from my personal perspective, I'm shocked (and a bit skeptical) that the people on the registry exercise this much...an hour a day? I don't quite recall how the questions are worded on the surveys they send us--do you know whether they differentiate between casual exercise like "a stroll in the park" and strenuous exercise like "cardio kickboxing"?

This could be important in determining if the people on the national weight registry had a similar experience to those in the human study you mentioned at the beginning of the article. I wonder how much exercise you have to do for how long in order to get a reduction in appetite.

I also wonder if the reduction in appetite was due to other factors...e.g. if you're spending two hours a day exercising, that's two hours a day you're not eating. Maybe the subjects' stomachs shrank. Maybe they took on healthier eating habits that led to them having more of an appetite in the morning (this happened to me).

I think the article made some interesting points and was a nice summary of all the recent weight control studies, but I'm still pretty skeptical about the idea of exercise leading to appetite control. It reminds me a little of the debate about whether to make birth control over the counter. While studies have shown that it's safe and that most women can self-prescribe, the medical profession is skittish about removing that leash that forces women to go into their OBGYN every year for a PAP smear, which is in itself a really essential component of women's healthcare.

Same deal with this study...medical experts know that "weight loss" is one of the major reasons that people exercise. Tell them that it doesn't help with weight loss, and many people may lose their motivation and miss out on all the other important health benefits associated with physical activity.

I'm not saying the study is completely invalid, but as someone who's been to obesity and back, I know from personal experience that there's a huge difference between a weight loss study, in which participants are monitored and required to exercise five days a week, and the reality of most everyday people who are trying to do this on their own. As you mentioned in the article, even MONEY can't necessarily motivate people to exercise.

In this day and age when everyone wants everything they eat and do to be a means to an end (yogurt that regulates your bowels, cereal that lowers your cholesterol, etc.) perhaps it wouldn’t be so terrible for people to stop thinking of exercise as a weight loss tool and start thinking of it as a fun activity that also happens to be good for you. After all, most of us spend hours a day doing activities – TV, video games, surfing the internet – that have absolutely zero health benefit—-and enjoy them greatly. ;-)