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Randomized trial · measured the question itself

12-week trial in 123 adults: weight rose with sugar and saccharin, not other sweeteners

Higgins and colleagues · The American journal of clinical nutrition · 2019

Original title: A randomized controlled trial contrasting the effects of 4 low-calorie sweeteners and sucrose on body weight in adults with overweight or obesity.

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What the study found

Mixed

Sugar and saccharin groups gained weight (+1.85 ± 0.36 kg and +1.18 ± 0.36 kg; P ≤ 0.02). No clear weight change with aspartame, sucralose or rebaudioside A. Blood sugar tolerance did not change.

The study at a glance

Type of study
Randomized trial
Who or what was studied
123 people · 154 adults aged 18 to 60 with overweight or obesity (123 finished)
What was tested
1.25 to 1.75 L a day of drink sweetened with sugar, aspartame, saccharin, sucralose or rebaudioside A, for 12 weeks
What it measured
The question itself: body weight and metabolic health
How long
12 weeks
Trial registration
NCT02928653
Who has a stake
No disclosure in PubMed
No disclosure in PubMed.
Journal
The American journal of clinical nutrition, 2019
Source
PubMed record 30997499. This page is based on the abstract only.

How much this study counts

  • ✓Randomized: people were put into groups by chance, so the groups start out alike.
  • •Medium size: 123 people.
  • •Lasted 12 weeks.
  • ✓Measured the question itself: body weight and metabolic health.
  • •The PubMed record has no conflict-of-interest statement.
  • •Summarized from the PubMed abstract only. The full paper may hold details the abstract leaves out.

✓ Strength– Limit• Note

These points come from fixed rules about the type of study, its size and length, what it measured, and who has a stake. Every study on Digestery gets the same rules.

Where this study sits

Each dot is one on-topic paper on this question. Steps near the top answer the question more directly.

↑ Stronger evidence

  1. Trials in people: body weight

    4

    1 benefit, 1 mixed, 2 no difference

    ↑ This study is the ringed dot

  2. Trials in people: other measures

    0

    None among the papers we read.

  3. Trials in people: lab tests or safety

    7

    1 benefit, 1 mixed, 4 no difference, 1 harm

  4. Population studies

    5

    1 benefit, 4 harm

  5. Blood levels and genes

    1

    1 harm

↓ Weaker evidence

  • Points to benefit
  • Mixed
  • No difference
  • No direction
  • Points to harm

How it fits with the other research

The short answer to “Do artificial sweeteners cause weight gain?”

Trials say no; population studies disagree.

Confidence: low. Based on 32 on-topic papers.

Read the full answer

Of the other 3 papers on the same step: 1 benefit, 2 no difference. This one found mixed. It differs from most of them.

  • Quoted in “What we found”: In a 12-week trial, sugar and saccharin drinks raised weight (+1.85 ± 0.36 kg and +1.18 ± 0.36 kg); aspartame, sucralose and rebaudioside A drinks did not.
  • Part of the finding “Against sugar, sweeteners mostly meant less gain”.
  • Marked as a key paper in the research timeline: Trial shows sweeteners differ; saccharin raised weight.
  • Open item for a person: Six trial papers have no COI statement in PubMed: Peters 2016, Higgins 2019, Tey 2017, Kwok 2024, Ahmad 2020, Orku 2023. Check full texts for funding.
  • Open item for a person: Higgins 2019 n set to 123 completers; abstract does not say how many of 154 randomized were analyzed.

Other papers on the same step

See all 32 studies on this question

How this page was made

Label

First read of the abstract
Claude Sonnet
Independent second read
Claude Haiku
Differences settled
The reviewer corrected 1 field after reading the abstract. Claude Opus 5.5.
Headline
Claude Sonnet, from the checked study record. A script checked its numbers and wording.
Numbers
Checked against the abstract by a script
“How much this study counts”
Fixed rules, the same for every study
Source check by a person
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