Walking may help overweight people curb sugar cravings

Walking for 15 minutes may help overweight people at least temporarily reduce cravings for high-calorie, sugary snacks, a small study suggests.

"This study showed that brisk walking can be used as a strategy to reduce momentary food craving," said Adrian Meule, a psychologist at Ruhr University Bochum in Germany who wasn't involved in the research.

Exercise may provide some cognitive stimulation that interferes with thoughts about the craved food, and the discipline to regularly take walks to circumvent cravings might also improve the ability to follow through with healthy food choices, Meule said in an email.

Globally, almost 2 billion adults are overweight or obese, according to the World Health Organization. This increases their risk of premature death, breathing difficulties, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, hypertension, fractures and mental health issues.

The study, by Larissa Ledochowski at the University of Innsbruck in Austria and colleagues, examined the impact of a 15-minute treadmill walk on sugar cravings in a group of 47 overweight people who were on average about 28 years old.

To elevate sugary snack cravings, participants were asked to abstain from eating any sweets for three days at the start of the study. They were also asked to fast, drink nothing but water, and avoid any exercise for two hours prior to each assessment of cravings.

When weight is gained, it becomes harder to move. The harder it is to move, the harder it is to shift the excess weight. "You have all the mechanical stress of excess weight, but then you also have the metabolic problem." The internal hormonal environment of someone who is obese (someone with a body mass index of 30-34.9) is different from that of a person with a healthy weight, says Scott-Dixon. "Fat is a metabolically active organ. It's not just storage, it actually secretes hormones that affect your energy levels." In short: "Even if you don't really feel that much pain, you just feel like crap."

For many of us, exercise simply isn't part of our daily lives, and for people who are significantly overweight this can be compounded by the fact that conventional advice about exercise sometimes just isn't possible to follow. Personal trainer Steve Barrett explains: "Exercise is stressful for the body – but for those who are severely overweight, their bodies are already stressed, their blood pressure is already raised, they are already fatigued, their joints already strained."

For the overweight, the wrong type of exercise can cause injury. (Scott-Dixon, for instance, said she had to take painkillers before every workout.) So to start off, Barrett suggests the gym represents a safe, controlled environment; even budget gyms have quality equipment designed with heavy people in mind. "A lot of overweight people find they have balance issues, so the treadmill is a very predictable and safe place to start," he says.