Quote:
Originally Posted by EasyRhino
It seems like the strongest possible argument that the study might be making is that NOTHING really revs the metabolism. Not weights. Not high intensity training... nothing. Calories burned during the exercise are the only calories that are burned.
Which is a little depressing.
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Exercise effects the thermic effect of food for hours after the exercise. You burn off more of what you eat.
Exercise habits cause behavioral changes in other areas, too. I was a slug most of my life, but I'm told that now I'm antsy and always on the go. I don't like to just sit around anymore. Not sitting around is usually NEPA is usually burning more calories.
Exercise tends to make us less likely to overindulge (we just did all that work, and don't want to waste it). You're increasing your odds of keeping on track.
Getting and staying healthy makes you more able to get up and move around more.
Mentally, following a good plan in one are (exercise OR nutrition) encourages you to follow a good plan in the other (nutrition OR exercise). Don't discount the mental side of things. It's the vicious circle effect, but just non-vicious. More snuggly...
So, while our actual, physical metabolism might be changed only slightly, all of these effects are still working for us. These effects and others are probably what sparked the idea that metabolism was being elevated. People exercises and lost more weight than the exercise alone could account for? Must be metabolism. Guess not, but just because the reasons are wrong doesn't mean the result isn't still here.
Also, in Leigh's metabolism book, she talks about "metabolism" (obviously) and how it's a collection of physical, hormonal, mental, situational, etc things. Our metabolisms aren't as simple as physical science would have us believe.