Nutrition Science and Everyday Application - beta v 0.1

Healthy Skepticism in Nutrition Science
By this point in the unit, you should understand the types of studies used in nutrition
research and the quality of evidence each can provide. As you sift through studies, there are
a few limitations of nutrition research that are always worth keeping in mind:
• Challenges in nutrition research: There are some inherent challenges to
researching what people eat and how it affects their health. This fact limits the
quality of evidence and stirs controversy in nutrition research.
• Influence of food industry funding: Because government funding for nutrition
research is limited, much of it is funded by the food industry. Industry’s primary
goal is to sell more of their products, so they have a conflict of interest that can
result in bias in the way they design studies and interpret the results.
Being alert to these two things means always examining nutrition research with a healthy
sense of skepticism. Let’s take a closer look at these two issues in nutrition science.
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