Did you know that an average person puts on about a pound – roughly half a kilogram – during the end-of-year festive season (specifically, between Thanksgiving and January)? Given that most of us already gain one to two pounds annually during our adult lives, it makes sense to avoid this extra pound from holiday over-indulgence.
How? By drinking a glass of water before meals. Apparently, by filling the stomach with water and thereby reducing hunger, studies have shown that this simple step stops us from eating too much, reports the New York Times.
A group of overweight people aged 55 and over were put on low-fat diets in a recent study by scientists from Virginia Tech. Half were asked to drink two glasses of water before meals, while the other half did not. In three months, the water group had shed 15.5 pounds on average while the control group had only managed to lose 11 pounds.
A similar result was found in another study in 2008 where the obese subjects who drank water before breakfast had reduced their calorie intake by 13 percent.
