Ultra-processed foods harm men’s health. They increase weight, disrupt hormones, decrease testosterone, and introduce harmful substances linked to declining sperm quality. They contain industrial and synthetic ingredients. This may be why over the past 50 years, sperm quality has plummeted.

[u/mvea]

https://cbmr.ku.dk/news/2025/not-all-calories-are-equal-ultra-processed-foods-harm-mens-health/

[u/duffman_oh_yeah]

The linked study is literally a study that says that.

Despite caloric matching of discordant diets, we observed differences in body weight accumulation between diets, which appear to reflect changes in fat mass. This uncoupling between total energy consumed and body weight suggests that total caloric intake is not the sole determinant of body weight gain.

[u/makesterriblejokes → u/duffman_oh_yeah]

What was the physical activity level of those who ate and didn't eat ultra processed food?

[u/vazxlegend → u/makesterriblejokes]

I didn’t see it reported in the study. I may have missed it but I looked pretty thoroughly and I didn’t see it mentioned.

[u/makesterriblejokes → u/vazxlegend]

Yeah I think that could be a big factor here if they didn't control that.

I think there's likely a correlation that individuals who do not eat ultra processed foods are also more likely to be more physically active than those who eat ultra processed foods.

[u/vazxlegend → u/makesterriblejokes]

In this studies case it seems like they assigned individuals a specific diet to adhere too so not sure about any correlation between activity level and a chosen diet can be made. However, I agree not controlling for activity level would still be problematic as there is no saying how active one random group was compared to the other. I think also adherence to the given diet might be a bigger problem aswell.