Is your weight genetic? Obesity genes account for only 5 percent of all weight problems. So 95 percent of any weight problems have nothing to do with your genes. This fact has not affected the high incidence of obesity we see in our culture. We can't blame the obesity problem on high fat diets either. Even though fat contains 9 calories per gram, as opposed to carbohydrates or protein which actually contain 4 calories per gram, we still can't nail our epidemic on the consumption of fat. In fact, research has shown that low-fat diets don't work either and they actually cause more harm than good. And to top it off - avoiding fat in your diet is not a major determinant of body fat. The Women's Health Initiative, which is the largest clinical trial of diet and body weight, found that 50,000 women on low fat diets had no significant weight loss.