Does Diet Coke Make You Fat?

If you go to your favorite search engine and type in “is diet coke fattening” then you are going to find a whole host of responses talking about how terrible diet coke or diet soda in general is for you and how it’s surely going to lead to you gaining more weight.  Even if you go to Wikipedia you may find that there is cited information about diet soda and weight gain.

So, does diet coke make you fat?   Well, based on the actual research (conducted by obesity expert Barry Popkin) it might, but it probably doesn’t.  The evidence produced by most research is just not conclusive enough to actually prove that you can gain weight from diet drinks.

Most of the information you read online about this supposed problem is based on a few studies done on rats at Purdue University and few studies done on people who drink sodas over a period of time.

What the experts say, including Popkin, is that these studies simply don’t make a convincing enough case to actually prove that diet/zero-calorie soft drinks cause people to gain weight.

But Popkins himself is about as close to an anti-soft drink person as you’ll find.  He spearheaded research into sugary sodas and led a massive effort to remove vending machines from our children’s schools.

Most experts are a little concerned that the bloggers online have answered the question of does diet coke make you gain weight and answered it with a resounding “YES!”  The problem, once again, is that these bloggers may be basing their information on studies that don’t conclusively prove that you can get fat drinking non-caloric beverages.  Popkin and his co-author (Richard D. Mattes who is a professor of nutrition at Purdue University) combed over the research and the analysis that was produced from the rat and people studies.  What they found was there was very little, if any, evidence to support the fact that diet drinks contributed to people being overweight.

There have been other studies looking for the answer to the question, “can diet coke make you fat?” and they have come to the conclusion that it can.  The only problem is that they were only observational so it’s not possible to say that the diet drinks were directly responsible for weight gain in the individuals that participated in the study.

So, if these studies are finding some connection between diet soda and weight gain, how can some researchers and experts claim that there’s not a connection.

The problem is that people may switch to diet drinks when they start gaining weight but they ignore the other aspects of their eating habits that may be causing the weight gain.  Some scientists call this the “Big Mac and Diet Coke” problem.

Researches tend to believe that those people who drink diet coke or other diet drinks may not have the healthiest diets and that’s the reason for the weight gain.

The Sweet Tooth Theory

Another problem that researchers have found is that the overuse of artificial sweeteners has led people to crave sweets all the time.  There can be an addiction that forms to sweets regardless of whether it’s caused by sugar or by a zero-calorie sugar substitute.

One doctor noted that he found patients of his that drank diet soda frequently were much more vulnerable to addiction to sugars he called “stealth” which are sugars that are added to foods that don’t taste sweet.  A lot of foods that are unhealthy for you and contain a lot of fattening calories are processed foods that have sugar (high-fructose corn syrup) added to them.   These foods don’t taste sweet but they contain that sugar that the addicted crave. Foods such as certain breads, pasta sauces, crackers, etc.

What’s shocking is that some pasta sauces you find at your local grocery store may contain more sugar than the toppings you put on your ice cream.

One expert asked the question, who would choose pasta sauce with this much sugar in it?  The answer, he said, would obviously be the person with the addiction to sweeteners.

Research has shown that drinking diet drinks does increase a person’s desire for sweeter foods.  Whether or not it actually causes people to gain weight has not been determined.

Bottom line is this, whether or not it causes weight gain is irrelevant.  It’s not good for you and there are better alternatives.  If you have to get that sweet flavor try having some hot  or iced green, herbal, or black tea with a little bit of honey in it.  It’s much better for you and contains enough caffeine to give you a nice boot.  Plus green tea has been shown to increase your metabolism so it can help you actually burn more calories!

More Great Weight Loss Tips: