The most effective diet requires just 15 minutes a day and a smartphone

Scientists claim that the most effective diet is based on self-monitoring of foods ingested throughout the day, with both portions and calories. But how much time do we need to be able to follow it? A new study shows that 15 minutes are enough per day. And there is more. Let's see the details of this research together.

To lose weight, the best method is to monitor yourself by taking note of all the foods you eat every day with all the portions and calories, by doing so we can realize our diet, regulating it and losing weight: and to do all this you just need 15 minutes a day. This is what researchers from the University of Vermont claim after having analyzed the behavior of some people who have been asked to monitor themselves for a limited period of time. Here are the details of the research.

15 minutes to lose weight. Experts explain that the best way to lose weight is to self-monitor yourself throughout the day and then take note of all ingested foods. This mechanism may seem annoying and therefore it risks making the potential of this type of diet quite ineffective. To understand exactly how much time such a practice requires per day, the scientists followed a group of 142 people for 24 weeks who were asked to update an online database with their daily culinary habits. From the collected data it emerged that on average people take 14.6 minutes a day to complete this task, a very limited time if we consider the actual benefits they have on health. Apparently, in fact, at the end of the study those who spent about 23.2 minutes a day on the database had lost 10% of their weight in the first six months of the experiment.

Just diet? Clearly the benefits of this approach are linked to a healthy and balanced diet and 20 minutes of physical activity each day. To our aid, to facilitate the task of daily compilation, there are also smartphones with dedicated applications that make monitoring very fast, but they must not be used during meals to avoid the opposite effect, as shown by a recent study.

Conclusions. Scientists advise this approach to get benefits from the diet and they remind us that obesity is a growing condition that is linked to chronic diseases such as type 2 diabetes, hyperglycemia, high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease and cancer: therefore staying fit is not just a matter of aesthetics, it is a matter of health.