Research suggests that increased meal frequency may contribute towards improved body composition. For example, researchers1 used a ten year longitudinal study to investigate the meal frequency of girls aged 9 to 19 years, and determined the association with body mass index (BMI). The meal frequency was assessed by food diary and the BMI was determined annually in a personal visit. The results showed that only 15 % of the girls were eating three or more meals per day regularly, and by the end of the ten year study this number had dropped to just 6 %. However, those girls who were regularly eating three or more meals per day had lower BMI scores when compared to those children who ate three or more meals infrequently. Black girls that ate three or more meals per day were less likely to have a BMI that indicated they were overweight.
It is not fully understood as to why an increased meal frequency improves body composition, but may related to the way the liver handles food. Small intakes of food are more easily processed by the liver because the metabolic pathways are not overloaded with substrates, with carbohydrate being used to synthesise new liver glycogen. However, large intakes overwhelm the hepatic metabolic pathways during processing and this causes a higher percentage of food to enter de novo lipogenesis for the synthesis of new fatty acids. These fatty acids are stored in the liver and also transported to the skeletal muscle for storage. This causes insulin resistance as the fatty acids interfere with the signal cascades of insulin. Once insulin resistance develops processing carbohydrate food becomes increasing more problematic and abdominal adipose tissue accumulates. Therefore more frequent and smaller meal consumption may optimises correct compartmentalisation of energy and prevent insulin resistance.
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