Fidget away the fat
it is a common observation. But scientists have not been able to explain how many people eat at will and yet manage to remain slim. Researchers have been trying to unravel this mystery for long and find credible explanations for this. The only reason provided so far is that perhaps this is a genetic trait.
However, a recently published study suggests that some people are able to simply fidget away fat. The study by Michael Jenson and his team from the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, usa , was designed to investigate why some people seem to relentlessly gain weight while others, on roughly the same diet, seem to stay slim. The study involved 16 volunteers who consumed 1,000 extra calories a day for beyond their dietary requirement to maintain a stable weight for eight weeks. Instruments were used to measure their energy use ( Science , Vol 283, No 5399).
By the end of the study period, some subjects gained as much as 7 kg while others gained as little as 0.9 kg. The difference, says Jensen, was the "fidget factor', defined as some sort of physical activity that some people do more throughout the day than others. This could be fidgeting or moving around or just being a little more restless. The people who did not put on much weight were those who had the biggest increase in calories burnt during everyday activities, such as fidgeting, moving around and changing posture. The researchers labelled this factor neat for non-exercise activity thermogenesis (thermogenesis means burning calories).
"Those who had the least change in neat gained the most weight,' says James A Levine, co-author of the report from the Mayo Clinic's endocrine research unit. " neat switches on in some people to