Recent findings are suggesting that
television viewing time is a risk factor for excessive weight gain among
adolescents.
Television isn’t the innocuous pastime many
assume it is, although a seemingly passive activity, it can stimulate many
pathways in the brain that real-life activity utilise. An example of this
phenomenon is found in sport, where athletes are advised by their coaches to
visualise the perfect execution of movements within and outside of training sessions.
Why? Because motor imagery (thinking about movement) and motor action
(performing actual movement) engage overlapping brain systems.(1) The act of
thinking about movement stimulates and reinforces the exact same neural
pathways that are used when the actual movement is performed. And television
works in a similar manner.
Television is primarily a visual context,
to which your eyes are the key conduit. The optic nerves that transmits
information from the retina to the brain, not only wraps around the
hypothalamus but also give off connections to the very areas that control your
neurotransmitters and hormones. As I’ve shown in previous articles the
hypothalamus is a key area for metabolism and especially hunger and thirst
regulation. The intensity, colours and shape of the light hitting your eyes
have numerous effects on your brain and the hormonal systems it controls. And
so research is unveiling.
Television is linked to two cognitive
functions that go part way to explaining the link between viewing exposure and
overweight. These two cognitive functions are called reward saliency and
inhibitory control. Television stimulates ‘wants’ (reward salience) and lessens
the ability to dampen down or stop a
particular activity or response (inhibitory control) to these ‘wants’.(2) And
because junk food is readily available in current society and strongly taps
into these reward pathways, that (junk) often becomes the focus of our hunting
and foraging expeditions into the deepest, darkest recesses of our kitchens. And
so again, the research is showing.
Recent studies are showing that increased television
viewing was associated with an increased intake of sugary drinks, energy dense
foods and trans fat consumption, with a concomitant decreased intake of fruit,
vegetable and fiber.(3, 4) Which is no surprise, since as I’ve shown in
previous articles, food manufacturers purposely create what is known as
hyper-palatability in certain lines of food to tap into these powerful
evolutionary drives.
This has an especially potent effect in
young children as they haven’t developed the mechanisms to detach themselves
from present stimuli as much as (some) adults, so are more at the mercy of
strong biological drives than the rest of us. Therefore with increased exposure
to television and its incentivising of ‘wants’, combined with a weakening of
the ability to resist these ‘wants’ in a child who is already undeveloped in
this regard, and the ‘super-charging’ of food to reward the consumer, you have
a perfect storm for excessive eating.
The storm however, can be weathered, it
just requires a first rate skipper to guide the vessel. And ‘Mon Capitan’, that
is where you come in…
As adults I believe we should take
responsibility for our children until such a stage where we have helped them
develop their own ability to control their own drives. I’m not telling you what
to do; I’m just presenting the information and possible solutions. What you do
with that information is entirely, and to paraphrase Bobby Brown, your
‘prerogative’.
References:
1- Baeck JS et al. (2012) Brain activation
patterns of motor imagery reflect plastic changes associated with intensive
shooting training. Behav Brain Res: Sep 1;234(1):26-32.
2- Chapman CD et al. (2012) Lifestyle
determinants of the drive to eat: a meta-analysis. Am J Clin Nutr.
Sep;96(3):492-7.
3- Miller SA et al. (2008) Association
between television viewing and poor diet quality in young children. Int J
Pediatr Obes.;3(3):168-76.
4- Ford C et al. (2012) Television viewing
associated with adverse dietary outcomes in children ages 2-6. Obes Rev.
Dec;13(12):1139-47. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-789X.2012.01028.x.
Current figures (2010/2011) have estimated
that 30% of children in the UK
are now either overweight (31%) or obese (29%). As you can hopefully appreciate,
there isn’t one simple factor (although the common perception is to try to find
one) that contributes to obesity, regardless of whether that person is an adult
or a child. There are, however, a few overarching factors that are certainly strongly
correlated, and in a lot of cases causative, to this outcome.
One significant feature found in current
life is television.
One recent study set out to determine
whether reducing television viewing time would have any effect of the rate of
weight gain in the subjects. The researchers observed a clear association
between reduced hours spent watching television and decreased weight gain over
one year. The findings suggest that television viewing time is a risk factor
for excessive weight gain among adolescents.
As suggested above overweight and obesity
is multi-factorial, so there are other key influences that need to be addressed
in order to assist our children in maintaining a healthier weight. However it
seems that the simple action of moderating time spent viewing television
actually creates an impetus for these other factors to fall into place.
So a logical first step would be to moderate
television exposure time. This doesn’t mean that you have to confine your
children to a monk-like life, as I’ll show you in a following Bitesize piece,
it may be as simple as a very brief activity exchange.
Reference:
Simone A. French, Nathan R. Mitchell, Peter
J. Hannan. Decrease in Television Viewing Predicts Lower Body Mass Index at
1-Year Follow-Up in Adolescents, but Not Adults. Journal of Nutrition Education
and Behavior, 2012; DOI: 10.1016/j.jneb.2011.12.008
Intra-abdominal obesity (visceral fat) is an important risk factor for
low-grade inflammation, which is associated with increased risk for
diabetes, cardiovascular disease as well as most prevalent disease states.
Generally, recommendations to treat or prevent overweight and obesity
via physical activity have focused on aerobic endurance training, as it
is was once thought that aerobic training was associated with much
greater energy expenditure during the exercise session than resistance
training. This vestigial thought process of the last century is now
changing in part to our better understanding and ability to measure less
accessible workings in the body.
The metabolic consequences of
reduced muscle mass that accompanies normal ageing and/or decreased
physical activity is currently one of the key ideas thought to lead to a
higher prevalence of metabolic disorders.
Because evidence
suggests that resistance training promotes a negative energy balance and
may change body fat distribution, it is possible that an increase in
muscle mass after resistance training may be a key mediator leading to a
better metabolic control. . It has also been recently shown
that resistance training has considerable effects on reducing visceral
fat and the inflammatory response across a broad spectrum of intensity
ranges.
So whether you train in a more typical hypertrophy
specific manner, or a use a protocol geared towards maximal strength,
both have benefits in protecting the body against excessive
inflammation.
Whatever your personal taste in fitness, make sure you flavour it with some variety of iron.
References:
Strasser, B., Arvandi, M. and Siebert, U. (2012), Resistance training,
visceral obesity and inflammatory response: a review of the evidence.
Obesity Reviews, 13: 578–591. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-789X.2012.00988.x
Çakir-Atabek, Hayriye et al. (2010), Effects of Different Resistance
Training Intensity on Indices of Oxidative Stress. Journal of Strength
& Conditioning Research, 24 (9): 2491-2497 doi:
10.1519/JSC.0b013e3181ddb111
Liposuction is one of the most popular elective surgeries in the world.
However a recent study shows that Nature does not like to be fooled.
Researchers at the University of Sao Paulo found that liposuction of
subcutaneous (under the skin) fat in the abdomen caused an increase in
visceral fat (fat surrounding the organs).
Visceral fat is a
significant risk factor in metabolic syndrome (also called Syndrome X or
the CHAOS series of disorders). So by attempting to take a short-cut to
leanness, you’re stimulating the body to produce a sub-set of fat that
is particularly potent in its effect on physiology. Visceral fat is
extremely pro-inflammatory, and if you’ve been following HPC-UK for a
while, you’ll know how devastating chronic inflammation is to your
health and how it is a driver of a majority of disease states.
Yet reducing body-fat can be achieved in pretty much anyone (99.99%)
with the right approach. The problem is most people have been seduced by
commercial company’s lies, which really have no interest in you
succeeding or finding out the truth of how to succeed, as by doing so
they’ll lose a repeat customer.
The key to losing body-fat is essentially two-fold:
(1) Provide the body with nutrients that it needs to optimise physical
structures and their metabolism. You can’t do this by reducing intake of
food; that would cause a deficit in nutrients required for optimum
functioning. You have to eat the right food, in the right amounts, at
the right time.
(2) Perform the right exercise to stimulate the
body to absorb and utilise the nutrients in the right way, and optimise
the expression of your genome to create a blueprint for a lean body
architecture. The majority of the exercise promoted by weight-loss
companies actually creates a body set up for fat gain, rather than loss.
If you’re intending to lose fat, be careful from whom you receive your
information; otherwise you can be figuratively jumping out of the frying
pan into the fire.
Reference:
Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism (2012). 97 (7); 2388-2395
Reality is a funny old
thing. The universe that we see, hear and feel is a tiny percentage of
what is actually there. Take for example vision. Humans have the ability
to perceive wavelengths of lights between 390 (Violet) -750nm
(Red), with the most clarity at 555nm. The wavelength 555nm is right
smack dab in the middle of the green portion of the spectrum.
This range makes up the most necessary colours we need to operate and
survive in our natural environment. We haven’t always had this ability
though, or rather we have, but we lost it, and then re-gained it again.
Contrary to what most people think Evolution isn’t a straightforward
gaining process, sometimes if an adaptation becomes superfluous to needs
(and thus costly to maintain) it can be ‘evolved out’. Our ancestors
(not Human) actually went through stages of acquiring colour vision when
it became a survival advantage, and then lost it when it was not
(during a stage where our ancestors were mainly nocturnal), and then
re-gained the ability when it once again gave our ancestors an
advantage.
Most mammals still haven’t regained a large range of
colour vision, whereas other species of animals can see wavelengths
outside of the Human range of perception. Bees and birds for example,
can see in the ultraviolet range of light, which is totally invisible to
us. Yet these species take advantage of it to navigate their world.
However ‘invisible’ and ‘does not exist’ are not two interchangeable
terms. The reality of different life forms is no less, or more real,
than each other. Reality simply ‘is’ whether we can understand and
appreciate it or not.
Perception is a key process in how much,
or how little of reality you can interact with, how much you can
control, and how much it can control you. Your perception of the world
influences ‘your’ reality.
In the past few years the research
into stress and health has been growing rapidly, especially in the field
of genetics and epi-genetics. Many papers have demonstrated that there
is a direct link between the stress response and health. The key word
here is response, which we will get to in a bit.
There are
different forms of stress: physical, chemical and emotional, all of
which can profoundly alter your reality, for better or worse. But here
we will concentrate on emotional (or psychological) stress.
The term stress isn’t inherently negative (or positive), but the common
understanding usually falls more to the former of the two expressions,
which is another evolutionary safety mechanism we shall not explore
here. Emotional stress comes in two forms: positive stress, which many
people do not know about, is called eu-stress, and negative stress,
which many DO know about, is called dis-tress. They are two sides of the
same coin; however, it is the distress side of the coin that is most
linked to ill-health and disease.
Stress like all other
emotions, does not exist in any object or situation. Some people have a
terrifying fear of cats (Ailurophobia), whereas others (usually ladies
of middle-age and beyond) have an obsessive love for them
(Ailurophilia). The emotion of fear (or love) has no physical existence
at all, except in a person’s expression of the emotion. And that
emotion, be it fear, love, excitement etc is created by the ‘meaning’
that a person gives (or attaches) to that object or situation. Emotions
therefore are generally created by memory and triggered by environment.
So if you change your perception (or the meaning you attach to
something) you can change your emotional response to pretty much any
object or event.
And so a recent study is proving. Researchers
at Penn State University, as part of a much larger study, surveyed 2000
people, once a day over 8 days, at two points 10 years apart. The survey
covered such things as the use of their time, their moods and any
physical health symptoms they had felt in the previous 24 hours. They
also asked about their productivity and any daily stressful events they
had experienced, such as being in a traffic jam, having a row (quarrel)
with somebody, or looking after a sick child.
As well as the
data collected from the surveys, the researchers also collected data on
the participant’s cortisol (one of the key stress hormones) levels
throughout these days.
The study was cleverly designed to not
only look at short term stress reactions, but also how this could
possibly manifest a decade later. And the study showed an interesting
result; people who become upset by daily stressors and continued to
dwell on them after they had passed were more likely to suffer from
chronic health problems -- especially pain, such as that related to
arthritis, and cardiovascular issues -- 10 years later.
The key
finding of the paper was that it isn’t stressor ‘exposure’ that caused
the chain of processes that led to ill health, but rather stressor
‘reactivity’.
Think about a time when you’ve been driving, if
you’ve been doing it long enough chances are that at one time or another
you’ve probably had a near-miss (near-hit really?). When this happens
there usually is an automatic reaction of fear and often anger. The more
enlightened amongst us, almost immediately, realise that they are
unhurt, calm themselves and continue along their path in life in quiet
serenity.
Those who do not realise this, allow the fear and
anger to remain and build, sometimes to the point of what is called
‘road rage’. Not only do they occasionally hurt others, but
every…single…time…they hurt themselves. Here’s how.
Your brain
wasn’t always as it is now, but unlike many items in history that no
longer exist and require speculation of their once upon a time
existence, our heritage is still firmly in place and fully visible with
the right approach.
If you slice a brain straight down the
middle, separating the left and right sides (or for the squeamish use an
MRI scanner), a lot of our history is revealed. These images are
plentiful on the internet, so do a search for a visual representation of
these structures; look for what is called a ‘mid-saggital section’.
The brainstem (pons and medulla oblongata) is our most primitive brain;
it’s a mass of nerves that unlike our brain today, formed the entire
brain of our ancestors. The medulla’s primary function is to stimulate
the vacuuming up of food and reject the bits that might cause us
problems, although we now call these gagging, vomiting, coughing and
sneezing. Together with the pons, the brainstem is the fundamental
structure involved in breathing, and heart function. This relatively
simple nervous system supports a very basic form of life; essentially
eating, pooping and a bit of locomotion.
As we evolved,
additional components and layers were added to these basic structures,
the next component being the cerebellum. The cerebellum adds to the
brainstems function by providing the ability to further control the
body’s function, especially in regards to movement. The cerebellum
allows for further refinement in motor control such as co-ordination,
precision and timing of movements.
Just in front of the
cerebellum is the forebrain which contains the R-complex, so called
because they first evolved in the (r)eptilian brain. This area of the
brain is responsible for instinctual behaviours such as aggression,
dominance, territoriality, and ritual displays. It still serves the same
purpose in reptiles, and us, today.
Above and surrounding this
area, are the paleo-mammalian and neo-cortex. The R-complex plus the
paleo-mammalian complex are commonly (but not quite accurately) grouped
together as the limbic system. The limbic systems adds to the above
R-complex behaviours with additional feelings of motivations (drives)
and emotions surrounding love, hate, joy, sadness, hope, despair and
sexuality. The neo-cortex adds to this further as does the cerebral
cortex.
The cerebral cortex is what most people in the public
consider to be the brain; it’s the wrinkly, cauliflower looking bit that
most of us know comes in two half’s (hemispheres). It is the area of
the brain that is involved in producing functions that most people would
recognise as what makes Humans ‘Human’. It plays a key role in memory,
attention, perceptual awareness, thought, language, and what we call
consciousness.
The ancient structures of our brain have been
within our genetic lineage for around 60 to 200 million years, depending
on the structure. The cerebral cortex in contrast has only been around
for 6 million years. And the Human version of the cerebral cortex is
thought to have occurred only 150,000 years ago in our evolution.
Because most people don’t consider the components and layers under the
cerebral cortex when thinking about the brain, they also don’t realise
the powerful influence these structures have on the newer evolved
structures and therefore function (perception being one) of the brain.
As a result of their deep seated rooting, the primitive structures hold a
lot of sway, and can easily over-ride the higher functions of the
recently evolved Human parts of the brain. If you let it.
If
you need persuading of this primitive brain ability to distort
perception, consider the use of substances that are commonly called
social drugs such as alcohol, nicotine, or more potent drugs such as
cocaine, amphetamines and other chemicals. These substances all work by
tapping into the primitive parts of the brain, so while under the
influence the feelings of confidence, fear, panic, ease, rage, and
pleasure can be amplified. But because the primitive brain in intimately
linked into the higher brain, the perceptions of the user also becomes
distorted as a consequence of these more fundamental changes. So
distorted thoughts occur in response, which is different for each
individual based on their personal memories and make-up. Sometimes these
perceptions can be experienced as heightened pleasure and ease, and
others depending on the past and current state of the individual can be
rather more unpleasant such as paranoia or abject terror, amongst
others.
This happens because anything that alters the input’s
into the brain, be it a chemical substance, a thought or a programmed
perception changes the neuronal function of your brain, the sum of which
absolutely governs the way your body functions and the thoughts that
you experience as consciousness.
A final example, just to
clarify how tapping into the primitive brain can profoundly distort your
perception of reality, is the chemical lysergic acid, colloquially
known as simply ‘acid’. ‘Acid’ is an extremely potent chemical, that can
cause an extreme change in the chemical functioning of your neurons so
that the user experiences altered thinking processes, synesthesia (the
stimulation of one sense causing an experience in another, such as
seeing sounds or hearing movements) and altered sense of time. Reality
hasn’t changed one bit, only the user’s perception of it.
Now,
it’s not a one way door, it certainly swings both ways. The primitive
parts of the brain can definitely influence the higher functions but so
can higher functions feed into the primitive structures. And once
triggered they (the primitive brain parts) cause not only altered
thought processes, as described above, but rapid and powerful changes to
the functioning of the rest of the body (for which they were originally
evolved), which left uncontrolled will certainly lead to ill health and
disease.
But being Human we are not as directly tied into
moment to moment stimuli as more simple life-forms. As suggested before,
we can understand that emotional (psychological) stressors do not exist
in any object or event. The stressor lies in the meaning we attach to
it. So by deciding to attach a different meaning we can alter our
perception of reality and our response to it, so that it not only
doesn’t harm us, but if we attach the right meaning can actually be
advantageous to our reality and our existence within it.
By
controlling your perception of life and how you respond to life events,
you can open up doors that either seemed locked or did not appear to
exist at all. The potential within most Humans is vastly untapped, yet
we all have the ability to claim this prize if we so choose. And therein
lies the crux, it all starts with a choice.
Learn to make the right ones.
Reference:
Annals of Behavioral Medicine 2012. DOI: 10.1007/s12160-012-9423-0
A recent study at Harvard University of almost 1,500 health
professionals showed that the men with the highest blood levels of
vitamin D also had the highest levels of Testosterone.
In the 25% of men with the highest vitamin D levels, total and free
Testosterone were on average 3 percent greater than the men with the
lowest 25% of vitamin D levels.
Vitamin D, as well as being
found in dietary sources, is also synthesised by an interaction between
the skin and sunlight. The researchers did not find a seasonal variation
in Testosterone, unlike they found with vitamin D. This could partly be
attributed to the fact that at lower levels the association between
vitamin D and Testosterone is linear, but not at higher levels of
vitamin D. A certain level of vitamin D is required for optimal
Testosterone metabolism, but levels beyond this do not stimulate
supra-physiological levels. This is because vitamin D is one of the many
links in the chain of synergy required to manufacture Testosterone.
Beyond addressing a deficiency (in vitamin D), any extra vitamin D will
not further raise Testosterone levels.
Higher levels of
vitamin D are beneficial for other reasons though, so don’t throw the
baby out with the bathwater. Also add to this that the majority of
people in the higher latitudes of the Nothern Hemisphere are vitamin D
deficient (ask your Doctor for a blood test to determine this), in which
case you could probably assume you might need a little boost in that
area, which will give you a 'boost' in others.
Reference:
Clinical Endocrinology. Volume 77, Issue 1, pages 106–112, July 2012
Low Testosterone increases the risk of heart disease and is strongly
linked to metabolic syndrome, decreased sexual performance, loss of
muscle mass, depression and decreased quality of life.
A recent study showed that sugar consumption has an abrupt effect on
the level of Testosterone production and availability once produced.
74 men (between the ages of 19-74 years) with varying glucose tolerance
(how well their body handles sugar) were selected to take part in the
study. The subjects were presented with a 75g oral glucose load and then
blood withdrawals were performed at 0, 30, 60, 90 and 120 minutes post
consumption. The blood was then tested for a number of indices related
to Testosterone metabolism.
The researchers concluded that
glucose ingestion induces a significant reduction in total and free T
levels in men, which is similar across the spectrum of glucose
tolerance.
So if you’re looking to maintain or increase your
level of ‘Vitamin T’, a good place to begin would be modulating your
sugar and high glycemic index carbohydrate consumption.
The fat in your body comes in a variety of flavours. The majority is
white adipose tissue (WAT) which is most easily recognised as the fat
that covers our body and serves amongst other functions as a major store of excess energy. Brown adipose tissue
(BAT) is a highly thermogenic tissue that converts food energy
(chemical) into heat instead of storing it as fat. Up until recently
that is all we thought there was; and seeing as Human adults have little
BAT, and it’s tricky to influence its activity, then unless a person
was very motivated to set up the right conditions then this seemed like a
dead-end. However this year (2012) researchers from the Dana-Farber
Cancer Institute discovered a new kind of fat cell called beige fat,
which works with exercise to promote fat (WAT) loss.
Beige fat
cells resemble WAT but function more like BAT in response to certain
signals. During exercise muscles produce a hormone called irisin, which
increases the activity of BAT and promotes fat loss. Beige fat also
increases the conversion of chemical energy to heat in response to high
levels of irisin.
Beige fat cells may be an important tissue for promoting exercise-induced fat loss.
Enter any gym or sports facility and you’ll see athletes during some,
if not all of their sessions listening to their iPod/ MP3 players. Many
athletes feel that specific music helps to
create a beneficial environment to get into the training groove. A
recent study by Cal State University (Fullerton) shows that they may be
right.
The study found improved performance in explosive
exercise when listening to self-selected music. Intensity is a key
component in increasing muscle mass, strength and power. Utilising the
right kind of music might be an easy method of achieving this aim.
To help you on the road to all around general awesomeness load up your iPod with this Badassery (www.deepseagreen.co.uk) and smash up those sessions.
Even among active adults there is a loss of about 20 percent of their
muscle mass between the ages of 40 and 60 years. Muscle loss, known as
Sarcopenia, causes reduced metabolic rate, progressive fat accretion, decreased control of blood sugar and reduced quality of life.
Wayne Wescott (Quincy College, Massachusetts), in a review of the
current literature, concluded that weight training increases lean mass
and metabolic rate while decreasing body fat in middle- and older-aged
adults.
Weight training was also found to improve physical
performance, walking speed, quality of life, mental function and
self-esteem. In addition it improves blood sugar regulation, blood fat
levels, preserves bone density and lowers blood pressure. It may also
reduce back pain and joint discomfort associated with arthritis.
Weight training is a key component in any wellness program, but especially for middle- and older-age adults.
Reference:
Current Sports Medicine Reports, 11: 209-216, 2012
Many people lose 25 to 50 pounds or more in a year. The secret is maintaining the weight loss.
After significant weight loss, metabolic rate slows by as much as 20
percent. A study from Boston Children’s Hospital found that dietary
composition affects metabolic rate after weight loss.
Researchers examined young adults who lost 10-15 percent of their
bodyweight. Low fat diets decreased metabolic rate more than low or very
low carbohydrate diets. However, most weight loss ‘experts’ still
recommend low fat diets for weight loss. The study showed that these
diets promote weight gain and trigger high blood pressure, abnormal
blood fats, abdominal fat deposition and poor blood sugar regulation.
The best strategy for preventing weight gain after significant weight
loss is to reduce sugar and glycemic load rather than restrict fat
intake.
Reference:
Journal of American Medical Association, 307: 2627-2634, 2012
