The third group served as a comparison group. They were not put on a diet at all, they simply received information on healthy eating. All women received the same advice to increase physical activity, especially walking.
The women were followed for 40 weeks, with an additional follow-up visit at 65 weeks. The researchers took weekly measures in a variety of areas. These included body weight, episodes of binge eating, depression levels and difficulty sticking with the diet.
The different data from the groups were collected and measured statistically to see if there were any differences in the areas looked at in the study, in particular, if women on a low-calorie diet were more likely to develop a binge eating disorder.
The original belief of the researchers as they went into this study was that the women in the two diet conditions would be more likely than the non-dieting women to...
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