Choosing a product from among all those that crowd supermarket shelves can be difficult. The color, images and any text on the packaging influence the decision. Highlighting the presence or absence of one or more nutrients in a product is one of the ways to get our attention (rich in fiber, fat-free, etc.).
These claims are called nutritional declarations and influence our perception of foods and the purchasing decision. The belief that a food with nutritional claims is healthy, or better than one without, can be a way to tip the balance.
Fiber is one of the nutrients most used in these claims and, apart from its demonstrated benefits, it is surrounded by an entire imaginary that attributes many other virtues to it. This is caused by numerous advertising campaigns aimed, mostly, at women. Whether with flat bellies, slim bodies or many other shapes, we are their main target.
Products made from cereals (breakfast cereals, bread, cookies, etc.) are the ones that use fiber claims the most to get our attention. Curiously, many vegan meat substitutes also use them, probably as added value compared to meat, which never contains said nutrient.
At this point, the question is obvious. Are all those products that make claims about fiber really healthy? Are they better than those that don’t advertise them? To answer these doubts, the authors of this article have carried out a study.
But first of all, let’s briefly explain how we did this research. To classify a product as healthy, it is not enough for some expert to say so, but validated criteria must be applied. One of the simplest is the nutrient profile model of the Pan American Health Organization and the regional office of the World Health Organization in the Americas.
Furthermore, to reach valid conclusions, it is necessary to analyze many products of each type. Well, when applying these criteria to more than 2,300 products for sale in Spain, the results were surprising. About 90% of the foods analyzed that make fiber claims are unhealthy because they are high in salt, fat, free sugars, saturated fat, or contain sweeteners.
With such a high proportion of unhealthy options, it might seem unnecessary to compare them to those who don’t make fiber claims. However, it is worth looking at the nutrients individually.
To nutritionally compare these two types of products, statistics are necessary. This determines whether the differences found are real (significant) or are a product of chance. Thus, applying statistical tests, we found many significant distinctions between products with fiber claims and those without.
However, one more twist is necessary here. Although the differences are significant, their nutritional importance may be low. For example, cookies with fiber claims provide 18 kcal less per 100 grams than the others, which will have no effect on the diet of people who consume them.
That “high-fiber” breakfast cereals contain 15% more protein will not nutritionally improve their lives either. Therefore, an extra criterion is necessary, which is the one that appears in the European Commission regulation on nutritional declarations. It states here that the change must be at least 30% for any nutrient, except 25% for salt.
When applied, the differences between products with fiber claims and those without are slim. The most important is that all types of foods analyzed have more fiber. This is because they use more whole grains and other specific compounds (different types of fiber, inulin, cellulose, hemicellulose, gums, mucilage, etc.).
There are only four more relevant changes. Two of them point to nutritional improvement: crackers, toast and similar products have less saturated fat. However, the other two point to a worsening: industrial bread and meat substitutes contain more fat.
We know that claims that highlight any nutrient affect our perception of food. Thus, claims about fiber can lead us to believe that these products are better than the rest. After analyzing a lot of them, our conclusion is that, beyond fiber, they are neither better nor healthy.
Therefore, although it requires more effort, we must consult the nutritional table and ingredients. This way we can focus our attention on what really matters: fats, saturated fats, sugars and salt. Trying to choose those products with the lowest content of these nutrients should be our goal.
If we want fiber, it is preferable to eat fruits, vegetables, legumes, pastas and whole grain breads. They will provide us with this and many other essential nutrients for us.
This article was originally published on The Conversation.
Ana Belén Ropero Lara is a professor of Nutrition and Bromatology and director of the BADALI project at the Bioengineering Institute of the Miguel Hernández University; Fernando Borrás Rocher is a professor of Biostatistics at the Faculty of Medicine of the Miguel Hernández University; and Marta Beltrá García-Calvo is a professor of Nutrition and Bromatology and collaborator of the BADALI project at the Bioengineering Institute of the Miguel Hernández University.
