Research paper
Fothergill E, Guo J, Howard L, Kerns JC, Knuth ND, Brychta R, Chen KY, Skarulis MC, Walter M, Walter PJ, Hall KD. Persistent metabolic adaptation 6 years after “The Biggest Loser” competition. Obesity. 2016;24(8):1612-1619. doi:10.1002/oby.21538
Why we cite it
The longest follow-up this library holds on metabolic adaptation after large weight loss. Biggest Loser contestants measured at baseline, at the end of the 30-week competition and 6 years later: 58.3 ± 24.9 kg lost, RMR down 610 ± 483 kcal/day; at 6 years, 41.0 ± 31.3 kg regained while RMR remained 704 ± 427 kcal/day below baseline.
Two words corrected 2026-09-02 (card SP97Y7), and the authors’ own conclusion is the standard. This section said the defence ”does not diminish with time — it actually intensifies” and that the study ”establishes that weight regain reflects powerful, persistent biological opposition rather than personal failure or lack of willpower.”
*The paper’s conclusion, verbatim: ”Metabolic adaptation persists over time and is likely a proportional, but incomplete, response to contemporaneous efforts to reduce body weight.” Persists is not intensifies, and ”proportional to contemporaneous efforts” is a different mechanism from the one this section asserted — it ties adaptation to what the person is currently doing, not to an escalating defence. The normative half — rather than personal failure — is not in the paper at all.* It may well be the right thing to tell a reader; it is not this citation’s to saywer.