When people try to work out why diets almost inevitably fail other than in the short-term, they usually concentrate on the biological fact that the body will rebound with stored weight after it suffers food deprivation.

That theory is now so well-tested as to be certainly true to some degree. Accurate though it is, actually it is only of secondary value in explaining why obsessive dieting not only persists within our culture but is in fact on the rise.

The fundamental answers lie in the mind and until dieters are helped to unpick and re-frame the influences that trap them within anxious minds and overweight bodies, the only thing that will change is the name of the next fad diet.

At The Weight Foundation we have launched an awareness campaign concerning a disturbing escalation of the Food Industry's hard sell, which we call Meal Stealing. Extra pressure is piling up on the millions of people already suffering confusion and panic regarding what they should do next about their growing dieting and weight worries.

And the attack on promoting unhealthy habits coincides with the release of our new 3 Small Steps self-help system, designed to be a collaborative solution towards assisting problem dieters worldwide to regain self-control against all of the influences supporting obsessive dieting.

Meal Stealing is a dramatic way of visualizing the commercial pressure creating the dieting culture, with strong emotional and cultural pressures completing the dieter's unholy trinity of beliefs and behaviors.

Consumers are used to seeing sex, fashion, love and status being used to sell food - and the food companies can and will quite naturally do everything within the law to promote themselves.

However, we are now seeing more and more attempts not just to squeeze certain foods on to the menu but also to force themselves further in as major dietary staples.

In the States, where snack food and out-and-out junk has for a number of years sought to displace traditional and balanced meals from the household menu, the trend is even more advanced than it is the UK - but this market is rapidly catching up.

The Weight Foundation identifies three specific areas which illustrate the trend. The first concerns breakfast cereals, the advertising of which has traditionally been about the choice of start-up fuel early in the morning. However, many commercials now present packaged cereal as an all-day food option.

Another example is the attempted re-branding of flavored noodles from being a snack into the status of a traditional food staple. This is a progression down the same road already well-traveled in the US, where a TV dinners mentality has become semi-legitimated by time alone.

A third area is that of convenience shopping. A typical example is that of the multi-role juggling of a modern homemaker. Her delayed and late evening food is shown as something like ice cream or chocolate, or even alcohol in place of food altogether, naturally on special offer that week in her local convenience store.

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