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Why That One Diet Trick Won’t Work1
“你的人生被你的肥肉毁掉了！”“要么瘦，要么死！”……现在这个社会，仿佛一旦你瘦成一道闪电，男朋友、好工作、高薪酬都会随之而来，所以“我要减肥”成了很多人的口头禅。为了减肥你都尝试过哪些方法呢？节食、运动，还是吃减肥药？那么结果呢？
1. diet： 节食；trick： 诀窍。
2. magic bullet： 妙招。
3. self-denial： 自我否定。
4. 我们深受计划这一谬误之害，比如相信自己一周之内就能建好一个新厨房，或者一下午就能完成一个项目，同样，我们也相信自己将来一定能更加井井有条，而且更加自律。fall prey to： 成为……的牺牲品；fallacy： 谬论；self-disciplined： 自律的。
5. Oxford English Dictionary：《牛津英语词典》。
6. in place： 准备就绪的。
7. out of date： 过时的；revision： 修订。
8. fire up： 激发，煽动。
9. syndrome： 综合征。
10. unrealistic： 不切实际的； inevitably： 不可避免地。
11. 她研究的一些学生已经连续十年尝试做出同样的改变，无奈屡试屡败，但他们每年都坚信这次会成功。in row： 连续，接连。
12. scarce： 缺乏的。
13. 营养学家“少吃多锻炼”的理论几十年来曾未变过，但这并没有让实践变得容易，这也是我们为什么如此热衷于尝试各种新的方法来帮助自己减肥。nutritionist： 营养学家；be keen to： 热衷于。
14. self-tracking： 自我追踪。
15. 几周前，我在手机上下载了一个计步软件。当我第一次达到每天10，000步的目标，看到手机屏幕上从空中落下绿色花屑以表庆祝时，我爱上了这种感觉。confetti： （婚礼、狂欢节中抛撒的）五彩纸屑。
16. confess： 承认。
17. option： 选择；pedometer： 计步器；tape： 胶带。
18. page counter： 页计数器。
19. intrinsic： 内在的；motivation： 动机；puzzle： 难题。
20. silver bullet： 高招。
21. regime： 常规强化训练； banned： 禁止的。
22. flexible： 灵活的；routine： 惯例，常规。
23. introduce： 引进。
24. trial： 试验。
25. Finland： 芬兰，北欧国家； restriction： 限制。
26. temper： 使缓和。
A huge number of people are looking for that magic bullet2 which will make them healthier， fitter and thinner. And of course we’d like it to be easy and not to involve too much self-denial3. We are ever optimistic. We think that we will be better people in the future. Just as we fall prey to the planning fallacy， believing that we can build ourselves a new kitchen in a weekend or complete a project for work in an afternoon， we think in the future we will be better-organised and more self-disciplined.4
One of the most famous examples of the planning fallacy is that of the Oxford English Dictionary5. In 1860 plans were in place6 to complete it within three years. In 1879 there was a new deal to publish in within a decade， but after five years they had only got so far as the word “ant”. It was finally completed in 1928， by which time it was considered out of date and revisions began at once.7
The same thing happens when it comes to trying to change your lifestyle. You read about a new idea and that optimism fires up8 all over again. This time it will surely work. At the University of Toronto Janet Polivy has been studying what she calls “false hope syndrome9”. She found that people set themselves unrealistic targets which they inevitably failed to reach， leaving them feeling worse about themselves.10 Some of the students she studied had tried and failed for 10 years in row to make the same changes in their lives， but each year they were convinced that this time it would work.11 When it came to dieting， some were starting 15 new diets a year. Not only were they optimistic about their chances of success， but about the difference that weight loss would make to the rest of their lives. They believed they would not only find a new boyfriend， but find a better job and get better grades. Even if they had succeeded in losing a lot of weight they were then hugely disappointed that their whole lives weren’t improved.
Sometimes the targets we set ourselves are just too high. Polivy found that if people aimed to go to the gym twice a week， but sometimes only went once， they were disappointed， even though this was still a big improvement on what they were doing before. They did not consider exercising once a week to be an improvement， but evidence of failure. When she set up a more realistic weight loss programme to test her theories， she found that if they set realistic goals many did succeed in losing weight and felt satisfied with the results.
One reason why dieting is difficult is that foods high in fat and sugar taste good. For thousands of years we have been attracted to those foods， not knowing if they will be scarce12 in the future. Now of course， in many parts of the world they are ever-available to us. The message from nutritionists to eat less and exercise more hasn’t changed in decades， but that still doesn’t make it easy， which is why we are so keen to try anything new that might help us to do it.13
The problem is that it can be hard to predict what will happen in the long-term. Take the latest trend for self-tracking14. I downloaded a step counting app onto my phone a couple of weeks ago and I loved the first time I reached the daily goal of 10，000 steps and watched green confetti coming down from the sky on the screen in celebration.15 （Although I confess16 that I’ve already reset the goal to 9，000 steps a day because keeping that up every day is harder than I expected， especially in a rainy English winter.） Now I know whether or not I’ve walked far enough， but I still can’t resist looking.
Counting your steps does get you to walk further， and a new set of experiments from Duke University in the US to be published in the Journal of Consumer Research， demonstrate that telling people how many steps they have walked or even how many pages they have read or how many shapes they have coloured in， does get people to walk further， read more and colour in more. So far， so good.
But there’s a problem. In the study students were offered the option of wearing a pedometer and half were instructed to check it regularly while the other half had tape put over the display， meaning they couldn’t see their steps.17 Those who knew how many steps they had taken walked further， but didn’t enjoy it as much. When reading was measured， once the page counter18 was gone， people read less. The researchers didn’t measure the long-term use of a step counter， but the fear is that if you start to see walking as work， rather than pleasure， then over time you’ll start doing less of it. It has been robbed of its intrinsic motivation， just as happened in experiments in the 1970s when children were paid to solve puzzles or to do colouring.19 As soon as there was a break they stopped， while the children who weren’t paid were more likely to carry on.
So far there is no silver bullet20， but constantly trying new strategies could have one advantage， provided we don’t get too disappointed if we fail. We might manage to break a habit. At the University of Hertfordshire， Karen Pine and Ben Fletcher tested a diet with no exercise regimes or banned foods，21 but did require people to do something different every day. It was based on research showing that overweight people are on average less flexible than other people； they stick to more routines.22 So their solution was to introduce23 variety into that routine.
Each week people chose two new activities from a list of 50， which ranged from drawing， taking a different route to work or even just change channels on the radio. The idea was to break everyday habits and that without even necessarily noticing people would eat fewer calories and take more exercise.
In a small trial24， it did seem to work. In 2014 researchers in Finland picked up on the idea of flexibility and trialled a diet in which people had strict rules about calorie restriction for seven weeks，25 followed by a period of where they had much more choice about what they ate. This helped people to keep the weight off in the longer term.
So perhaps we need not be afraid of trying new strategies of getting ourselves to eat less and move more， while tempering26 our optimism a bit and accepting there is no magic bullet.
“你的人生被你的肥肉毁掉了！”“要么瘦，要么死！”……现在这个社会，仿佛一旦你瘦成一道闪电，男朋友、好工作、高薪酬都会随之而来，所以“我要减肥”成了很多人的口头禅。为了减肥你都尝试过哪些方法呢？节食、运动，还是吃减肥药？那么结果呢？
1. diet： 节食；trick： 诀窍。
2. magic bullet： 妙招。
3. self-denial： 自我否定。
4. 我们深受计划这一谬误之害，比如相信自己一周之内就能建好一个新厨房，或者一下午就能完成一个项目，同样，我们也相信自己将来一定能更加井井有条，而且更加自律。fall prey to： 成为……的牺牲品；fallacy： 谬论；self-disciplined： 自律的。
5. Oxford English Dictionary：《牛津英语词典》。
6. in place： 准备就绪的。
7. out of date： 过时的；revision： 修订。
8. fire up： 激发，煽动。
9. syndrome： 综合征。
10. unrealistic： 不切实际的； inevitably： 不可避免地。
11. 她研究的一些学生已经连续十年尝试做出同样的改变，无奈屡试屡败，但他们每年都坚信这次会成功。in row： 连续，接连。
12. scarce： 缺乏的。
13. 营养学家“少吃多锻炼”的理论几十年来曾未变过，但这并没有让实践变得容易，这也是我们为什么如此热衷于尝试各种新的方法来帮助自己减肥。nutritionist： 营养学家；be keen to： 热衷于。
14. self-tracking： 自我追踪。
15. 几周前，我在手机上下载了一个计步软件。当我第一次达到每天10，000步的目标，看到手机屏幕上从空中落下绿色花屑以表庆祝时，我爱上了这种感觉。confetti： （婚礼、狂欢节中抛撒的）五彩纸屑。
16. confess： 承认。
17. option： 选择；pedometer： 计步器；tape： 胶带。
18. page counter： 页计数器。
19. intrinsic： 内在的；motivation： 动机；puzzle： 难题。
20. silver bullet： 高招。
21. regime： 常规强化训练； banned： 禁止的。
22. flexible： 灵活的；routine： 惯例，常规。
23. introduce： 引进。
24. trial： 试验。
25. Finland： 芬兰，北欧国家； restriction： 限制。
26. temper： 使缓和。
A huge number of people are looking for that magic bullet2 which will make them healthier， fitter and thinner. And of course we’d like it to be easy and not to involve too much self-denial3. We are ever optimistic. We think that we will be better people in the future. Just as we fall prey to the planning fallacy， believing that we can build ourselves a new kitchen in a weekend or complete a project for work in an afternoon， we think in the future we will be better-organised and more self-disciplined.4
One of the most famous examples of the planning fallacy is that of the Oxford English Dictionary5. In 1860 plans were in place6 to complete it within three years. In 1879 there was a new deal to publish in within a decade， but after five years they had only got so far as the word “ant”. It was finally completed in 1928， by which time it was considered out of date and revisions began at once.7
The same thing happens when it comes to trying to change your lifestyle. You read about a new idea and that optimism fires up8 all over again. This time it will surely work. At the University of Toronto Janet Polivy has been studying what she calls “false hope syndrome9”. She found that people set themselves unrealistic targets which they inevitably failed to reach， leaving them feeling worse about themselves.10 Some of the students she studied had tried and failed for 10 years in row to make the same changes in their lives， but each year they were convinced that this time it would work.11 When it came to dieting， some were starting 15 new diets a year. Not only were they optimistic about their chances of success， but about the difference that weight loss would make to the rest of their lives. They believed they would not only find a new boyfriend， but find a better job and get better grades. Even if they had succeeded in losing a lot of weight they were then hugely disappointed that their whole lives weren’t improved.
Sometimes the targets we set ourselves are just too high. Polivy found that if people aimed to go to the gym twice a week， but sometimes only went once， they were disappointed， even though this was still a big improvement on what they were doing before. They did not consider exercising once a week to be an improvement， but evidence of failure. When she set up a more realistic weight loss programme to test her theories， she found that if they set realistic goals many did succeed in losing weight and felt satisfied with the results.
One reason why dieting is difficult is that foods high in fat and sugar taste good. For thousands of years we have been attracted to those foods， not knowing if they will be scarce12 in the future. Now of course， in many parts of the world they are ever-available to us. The message from nutritionists to eat less and exercise more hasn’t changed in decades， but that still doesn’t make it easy， which is why we are so keen to try anything new that might help us to do it.13
The problem is that it can be hard to predict what will happen in the long-term. Take the latest trend for self-tracking14. I downloaded a step counting app onto my phone a couple of weeks ago and I loved the first time I reached the daily goal of 10，000 steps and watched green confetti coming down from the sky on the screen in celebration.15 （Although I confess16 that I’ve already reset the goal to 9，000 steps a day because keeping that up every day is harder than I expected， especially in a rainy English winter.） Now I know whether or not I’ve walked far enough， but I still can’t resist looking.
Counting your steps does get you to walk further， and a new set of experiments from Duke University in the US to be published in the Journal of Consumer Research， demonstrate that telling people how many steps they have walked or even how many pages they have read or how many shapes they have coloured in， does get people to walk further， read more and colour in more. So far， so good.
But there’s a problem. In the study students were offered the option of wearing a pedometer and half were instructed to check it regularly while the other half had tape put over the display， meaning they couldn’t see their steps.17 Those who knew how many steps they had taken walked further， but didn’t enjoy it as much. When reading was measured， once the page counter18 was gone， people read less. The researchers didn’t measure the long-term use of a step counter， but the fear is that if you start to see walking as work， rather than pleasure， then over time you’ll start doing less of it. It has been robbed of its intrinsic motivation， just as happened in experiments in the 1970s when children were paid to solve puzzles or to do colouring.19 As soon as there was a break they stopped， while the children who weren’t paid were more likely to carry on.
So far there is no silver bullet20， but constantly trying new strategies could have one advantage， provided we don’t get too disappointed if we fail. We might manage to break a habit. At the University of Hertfordshire， Karen Pine and Ben Fletcher tested a diet with no exercise regimes or banned foods，21 but did require people to do something different every day. It was based on research showing that overweight people are on average less flexible than other people； they stick to more routines.22 So their solution was to introduce23 variety into that routine.
Each week people chose two new activities from a list of 50， which ranged from drawing， taking a different route to work or even just change channels on the radio. The idea was to break everyday habits and that without even necessarily noticing people would eat fewer calories and take more exercise.
In a small trial24， it did seem to work. In 2014 researchers in Finland picked up on the idea of flexibility and trialled a diet in which people had strict rules about calorie restriction for seven weeks，25 followed by a period of where they had much more choice about what they ate. This helped people to keep the weight off in the longer term.
So perhaps we need not be afraid of trying new strategies of getting ourselves to eat less and move more， while tempering26 our optimism a bit and accepting there is no magic bullet.