Trade Magazines & Scholarly Articles

Crowe, Tim. “Nutrition Messages Given by Fad Diets Can Alter People’s Food Perceptions”. Nutridate. May 2008.

This article discusses a clinical trial evaluating four fad diets: the Atkins’ diet, Weight Watchers, the Zone diet and the Ornish diet. The trial discovered that these diets, overall, resulted in minimal weight loss, which was difficult to sustain. Crowe, a senior lecturer at Deakin University, explained that fad diets are misunderstood and the public is given the wrong idea. As a result, people do not know which foods to consume and which to avoid. The article is easy to read and information is clearly organized under subtitles. In addition, Crowe provides graphs to support his data. This would be a strong resource for a journalist to use because it discusses a revealing clinical trial. 

 

Daniels, June. “Fad Diets: Slim on Good Nutrition”. Nursing. Dec. 2004.

This article outlines fad dieting from a medical prospective. Intended for doctors, it details the most popular diets while describing the drawbacks in direct connection to the body. There are sidebars that give advice for overweight patients, how to spot a fad diet, and important web sites. In addition, there are tips on how doctors can help patients who have fallen for weight loss schemes. This resource would be useful because it offers a different viewpoint than most other articles written on the subject. It gives a clear outlook on how this “medical condition” would be treated. 

 

MedInfo- Medical Information & Health Directory. (2008) Popular Fad Diets- Why Thy Can Make You Sick. Retrieved April 16, 2008, from http://www.medinfo2004.org/popular- fad-diets-why-they-can-make-you-sick-1140.

This website is an online health directory that lists information by subject and recent articles in the news. It offers multiple links and sources on fad diets and studies that have been conducted. This article provides factual information on the causes and results of what happens after someone has tried fad diets. It outlines a study done on college students, recognizing that when a student ends a fad diet they often consume a significantly greater amount of calories causing a weight gain.  There is also a list of serious health risks involved in fad diets. This source would be helpful because it directly relates to college students and provides a case study, which would have a huge impact if referenced to in a story.