Nutritional Pearls: Is Eating a Good Breakfast Important For Weight Loss?

Laura is a 34-year-old woman who has been struggling to lose weight for several years. When asked about her eating habits, she tells you that she normally has a cup of coffee for breakfast, a large lunch, and a large dinner.

How do you advise your patient?
(Answer and discussion on next page)

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Answer: Eating a good breakfast is important in managing and losing weight.

Previous research has shown that individuals who eat breakfast tend to eat more regularly and sensibly throughout the day—and in turn, have better cholesterol scores and insulin response—than those who skip breakfast. A breakfast diet that contains eggs reportedly leaves individuals feeling more satisfied¹ and those who eat a high-fiber breakfast tend to eat less at lunch.²

It's not just what you eat at breakfast that seems to matter, however. A 2014 study found that showed that women who ate half of their daily calories at breakfast lost more weight than women who ate half their calories at the evening meal.³ However, a group of researchers in Japan noted that studies like this tend to be under at least moderately controlled conditions, with people receiving explicit instructions on what to eat or even receiving their meals in labs.
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So, what about people leading everyday lives? If they ate more breakfast, did they eat less at later meals? Laboratory conditions can sometimes be very different than what researchers call “free-living” conditions, which can yield very different results.

The Research

The researchers recruited 116 women and 119 men, evenly distributed across decades of age, from 4 very different areas of Japan (urban, inland rural, coastal rural, and urban island).⁴ The participants kept detailed food diaries for 3 weekdays and 1 weekend day for each of the 4 seasons for just over a year—for a total of 16 days for each person. Their daily diet (breakfast, lunch/afternoon snack, and dinner/evening snack) was analyzed for total calories as well as grams of macronutrients (protein, carbohydrate, and fat). All this data was converted to percentages of the individual's intake for that day, and then averaged over the year.

The Results

Overall, the researchers noted that the women in their sample tended to eat their largest meal in the afternoon, while men tended to eat their largest meal in the evening. That said, those who ate a larger portion of their total daily caloric intake in the morning did tend to eat a smaller percentage of their daily calories later in the day—and their total number of calories tended to be lower, on average.

Specifically, those who ate more carbohydrates at their morning meal tended to eat fewer calories later in the day, but that did not mean they ate fewer calories in total. On the other hand, a larger percentage of calories from fat in the morning meal meant both lower caloric intake in later meals as well as eating fewer calories overall.

Unlike the women in the controlled study, the participants in this study were distributing their calories more or less evenly throughout the day: The distribution of calories for breakfast (22.6% in men vs 24.7% in women), lunch (33.8% in men vs 36.5% in women), and dinner (43.6% in men vs 38.8% in men). Similar numbers are likely to apply in Western countries.

What's the “Take Home”?

The findings from this study underscore the importance of a good breakfast in managing your weight—or losing weight, if that's your goal.

References:

1. Hu FB, Stampfer MJ, Rimm EB, et al. A prospective study of egg consumption and risk of cardiovascular disease in men and women. JAMA. 1999;281(15)1387-1394.
2. Samra RA, Anderson GH. Insoluble cereal fiber reduces appetite and short-term food intake and glycemic response to food consumed 75 min later by healthy men. Am J Clin Nutr. 2007;86(4):972-979.
3. Jakubowicz D, Barnea M, Wainstein J, Froy O. High Caloric intake at breakfast vs. dinner differentially influences weight loss of overweight and obese women. Obesity. 2013; 21(12):2504-2512.
4. Tani Y, Asakura K, Sasaki S, et al. Higher proportion of total and fat energy intake during the morning may reduce absolute intake of energy within the day. An observational study in free-living Japanese adults. Appetite. 2015;92(9):66-73.