Can You Trust Internet Weight Loss Advice? :

There is no denying that the internet contains it's fair share of dubious weight loss advice - but it can also be a very reliable source of information.

The people in white coats have examined advice posted on weight loss forums and concluded that:

People who seek out general weight loss information via Internet forums will, more often than not, receive correct information. ( reuters )

The research team looked at postings on 18 on-line forums over a one-month period ( see abstract ). They found that:

• Of the 654 messages responding with weight loss advice - only 8.6% were erroneous (and that a third of this misinformation was later corrected).
• 6.6% of messages advised potentially 'harmful' weight loss methods (again some of the messages were corrected later).

The telling factor:
Erroneous information was more likely to be provided by low-activity forums (< 1,000 messages per month).

What about Diet Blog?
Diet Blog is not a forum in the strict sense - but it does facilitate discussion and advice. In case you're wondering - the site receives over 1,000 user comments per month - all of which are moderated.

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