Soy and Weight Loss
What is the real scoop?
Soy has been featured in news headlines for several years. The most common of these news stories revolves around soy’s apparent near miraculous abilities to aid in weight loss efforts. Is this all it is cracked up to be, or is there more to the story?
What’s In the Fine Print?
Reading studies online, or in medical journals or fitness magazines often leads to a conclusion differing somewhat from the rosy news bites featuring soy as the super weight loss champion.
One of the first inconsistencies of note are statements claiming soy has an effect on the ‘fullness’ receptors in the brain. The actual truth is that researchers have a lot more work to do to find out how soy proteins affect the body in ways that result in weight loss if they do at all.
Some studies designed to prove the hypothesis that soy has ability similar to leptin which tells the brain it is full and thus curtails appetite have concluded with interesting results. The findings were not so much that soy had a diminishing effect on appetite. Instead it seems that soy might have a simulative effect on metabolism. Preliminary studies are favorable to soy’s inclusion in a weight loss regime.
More Questions
Before all of overweight America runs out and begins a three week soy burger feast there is more to know. Men, for example, should limit their soy intake. Soy is naturally high in the female hormone estrogen making it an unwise choice for high levels of consumption in a male system.
Soy is also not such good news for anyone who suffers form thyroid issues. It might not even be considered great in large amounts for those with healthy thyroids. In the media storm surrounding soy, consumption in general has increased. With this increase hypothyroidism has also gone up. It is now suspected that there is a correlation between these two events and soy is being implicated as an accomplice.
Buyer Beware
Soy might have a few dietary boons, as well as red flags but one thing that is certain is that soy sellers want to sell their product. Scrupulous hucksters stop at nothing to sell their wares. One example is the fabrication study results. It is not unheard of for sellers to create poorly designed or fictional studies in an effort to boost sales.
One soy seller's study published the findings that their soy product helped 60 plus women to loose over 7 pounds in four weeks. These claims were all true, but dietary changes such as the complete substitution of all junk foods, late night snacks and sodas with soy chips only, as per study conditions required was more likely the reason these women lost weight. It wasn’t necessarily magical components unique to the soy chips…rather the marked decrease in calories that resulted in the shedding of excess pounds.
