Why do men start accumulating more stomach fat at around the same age range?
In: Biology
Generally, as people get older they become less active and eat the same amount of calories or more and therefore gain weight. Men tend to gain more weight around the stomach than other areas as opposed to women who tend to put on more weight on their legs etc.
While, there is some decrease in metabolism with age, its fairly small. The main culprit is lack of activity compared to youth.
Two reasons
1 – They produce less testosterone as they age and increase estrogen which makes more fat.
2 – They tend to be more sedentary.
They eat more kcal than they needed per day. And its not a decline of exercise, its [a recent trend](https://dl.dropbox.com/s/2u8m7b6sp1lqzn3/5762476.jpg) since pre-1990 men would still have ‘slowed down’ with age.
Acceptable portion sizes increased as well as regular snacks. They measured the activity levels and kcal expenditure using doubly labelled water(insanely accurate) of the Hadza, a tribe of modern hunter-gathers that have a rough lifestyle in order to secure food. Comparing with city dwelling desk drivers, the difference in overall expenditure was minimal.
https://today.duke.edu/2019/01/living-caveman-won%E2%80%99t-make-you-thin-it-might-make-you-healthy
If you want to look at trends which still include acceptable portion sizes, then look at the japanese.
tl;dr you really can’t outrun over eating.
We forget that we aren’t harboring the metabolism of a 22 year old anymore and maintain the same lifestyle as that kid. The older you get the little harder you have to try to maintain your health. If you stay active and pay attention to your diet you won’t have the problem. Also, booze. That “get hammered and eat late” routine is havoc for the older dudes. It’s really just a matter of showing some discipline and not treating yourself like shit. Follow general logic for healthy lifestyle guidelines and it’s easy to not be chunky.
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More work, less exercise, wives getting old and unattractive, so the major source of pleasure is food and beer.
Decrease in activity, like moving to a desk job for example. Input (calories) stays the same while output (burning those calories) drops.
Stress hasn’t been mentioned here yet that I have seen. As life gets more stressful, and believe me it f***ing does, you release more junk (I think it is cortisol) that retains more fat. Men tend to put it on their bellies. Some men accumulate fluid in their abdomen, and some drink too much alcohol.
Some have suggested that it is to protect the inner organs since men are more likely to be in fights. A decent layer of fat provides extra protection from blunt force trauma to the torso and even decent cuts and stabs.
Inner fat is more unhealthy in general, but if you live in prehistoric times you might not even live long enough for that to matter.
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