Almonds vs. Cereal-Based Snacks: A Clinical Trial Design to Compare Satiety Hormones and Food Intake

Understanding how different snack choices impact appetite regulation and satiety is crucial for managing body weight and preventing overconsumption. Current dietary guidelines often recommend nutrient-dense snacks, but specific comparisons of their physiological effects are needed. Many processed snacks contribute to excess caloric intake without providing sustained fullness, leading to subsequent overeating. This study aims to delineate the acute hormonal and subjective satiety responses to two distinct snack types, almonds and a cereal-based snack, to identify which might be more effective in promoting satiety and reducing overall energy intake.

This study is designed as a seven-arm clinical trial comparing almonds and a cereal-based snack in healthy volunteers. Participants will undergo a meal challenge protocol to assess acute responses of appetitive hormones and ad libitum food intake at a dinner meal. Additionally, the study will evaluate self-selected and self-reported food intake under free-living conditions to determine energy compensation for the added snack calories. The protocol also includes interventions with three different fiber-enriched breads and a control bread, consumed with skim milk at breakfast, and a control pudding or Gentiana lutea L. ext in other arms, though the primary comparison focuses on the two snacks.

This abstract describes the design and hypotheses of a clinical trial comparing the satiety effects of almonds versus a cereal-based snack. No specific findings or numerical results are presented in this preliminary study description. The investigators hypothesize that acute responses of appetitive hormones to a meal challenge protocol will differ between snack types, based on multivariate models of satiety that will be predictive of ad libitum food intake at a dinner meal. They also aim to estimate if, under free-living conditions, self-selected and self-reported food intake will show appropriate energy compensation for the added calories of the snacks, and determine if one type of snack is superior in this regard. Results regarding these hypotheses are pending completion of the study.