Vox has posted a great article with a somewhat misleading title—a summary of the research on the effects of exercise and diet on weight loss.

The bottom line: exercise has huge physical and mental health benefits, but is surprisingly ineffective as a driver of weight loss.

There are a couple of reasons for that. One is behavioral. We often reward ourselves after exercise with a treat or an extra portion at the next meal, wiping out all of the caloric gains from the workout. Think how long it takes to eat a candy bar or a slice of pizza and how long it takes to burn the equivalent in calories with exercise. The other reason is that we are not linear “calories in/calories out” machines. Our metabolisms adjust to changes in activity and diet in surprising ways, so burning 1,000 calories in a vigorous workout doesn’t automatically add to your total calories burned for the day. Research suggests a diminishing return from extra exercise—either our baseline metabolism adjusts downward or we become less active in the hours we are not exercising.

There are important lessons here, both for our personal health and for how we frame messages and create tools to influence population health.

http://www.vox.com/2016/4/28/11518804/weight-loss-exercise-myth-burn-calories