Studies have shown that if you’re planning to lose weight you need to discuss on what groceries you are shopping for and not deviate. Avoid friends offers of eating sweet treats and boost intake of fruit and vegetables and plan your day to day meals.

Planning your meals in advance and sticking to it makes you a healthy person. Studies show that this leads to weight loss because you fill up on healthy foods and feel less tempted to eat fatty snacks. Psychologist Cristina Albuquerque Godinho, from the Lisbon University Institute in Portugal, said the key to success was planning ahead and motivation.  She added: ‘Buying food ad hoc in the supermarket is not a helpful approach. Write a list and make a deliberate intention to change behaviour or lose weight, because this is a strategy that works.’
Miss Godinho said: ‘We found that having strategies in place to deal with a range of eating situations that could undermine good intentions is very important, and helps people to regulate their daily dietary choices.

She added that eating more fruit and vegetables had been proven to keep weight down partly because it replaced less healthy food. People who said they would plan in advance how to get their five-a-day or more were much more likely to succeed in eating healthily. Those who understood the health benefits of eating well also found it easier to change their habits, according to the research to be published in the British Journal of Health Psychology.