Research paper
Speakman JR, Levitsky DA, Allison DB, Bray MS, de Castro JM, Clegg DJ, Clapham JC, Dulloo AG, Gruer L, Haw S, Hebebrand J, Hetherington MM, Higgs S, Jebb SA, Loos RJF, Luckman S, Luke A, Mohammed-Ali V, O’Rahilly S, Pereira M, Perusse L, Robinson TN, Rolls B, Symonds ME, Westerterp-Plantenga MS. Set points, settling points and some alternative models: theoretical options to understand how genes and environments combine to regulate body adiposity. Disease Models & Mechanisms. 2011;4(6):733-745. doi:10.1242/dmm.008698
Why we cite it
A theoretical review comparing the dominant models of body-weight regulation (Disease Models & Mechanisms, 2011). *This read ”the most comprehensive” until 2026-09-02 — a superlative the paper does not claim, and the fourth of its kind corrected today after definitive, authoritative and the definitive. The rest of this section was already right and is why the superlative stood out: it says the paper proposes the dual intervention point model as a synthesis, and that neither existing model is adequate alone* — which is the paper’s own argument, in its own register. By showing that neither the set point model (active biological defense of a target weight) nor the settling point model (passive equilibration with environment) is adequate alone, and proposing the dual intervention point model as a synthesis, this paper gives the project a nuanced framework for explaining why weight loss is biologically difficult without reducing the explanation to simple determinism or simple environment.