Rails 4 - Restrict retrieved columns from associated models - ruby-on-rails

Question

I'm new to Rails, and while writing Active Record queries, I notice that all columns of all associated tables are being retrieved. I would like to tell Active Record which fields from which tables ought to be retrieved. How would go about doing that?
My models and their associations are as follows:
class User < ActiveRecord::Base
has_one :profile
has_many :comments
has_many :posts
end
class Profile < ActiveRecord::Base
belongs_to :user
end
class Comment < ActiveRecord::Base
belongs_to :user
belongs_to :post
end
class Post < ActiveRecord::Base
belongs_to :user
has_many :comments
end
I'm following the Rails Edge Guides, and when I try to use select("users.id, profiles.first_name, profiles.last_name, comments.comment") to specify the field lists, I get a deprecation warning on the Rails console (and the SQL query that is run is a LEFT OUTER JOIN of all tables involved, but it still includes all columns):
DEPRECATION WARNING: It looks like you are eager loading table(s) (one of: users, posts) that are referenced in a string SQL snippet. For example:
Post.includes(:comments).where("comments.title = 'foo'")
Currently, Active Record recognizes the table in the string, and knows to JOIN the comments table to the query, rather than loading comments in a separate query. However, doing this without writing a full-blown SQL parser is inherently flawed. Since we don't want to write an SQL parser, we are removing this functionality. From now on, you must explicitly tell Active Record when you are referencing a table from a string:
Post.includes(:comments).where("comments.title = 'foo'").references(:comments)
If you don't rely on implicit join references you can disable the feature entirely by setting `config.active_record.disable_implicit_join_references = true`. (called from irb_binding at (irb):34)

Answer 1

Check if following work for you
Class User < ActivcRecord::Base
default_scope select("column1, column2, column3")
end

Answer 2

Buried deep inside the Rails Edge Guides for Active Record Query Interface, I found the answer. The trick is to use scopes for the particular association type where you want to restrict the retrieved fields.
Quoted directly from the guide:
4.1.3 Scopes for belongs_to
There may be times when you wish to customize the query used by belongs_to. Such customizations can be achieved via a scope block. For example:
class Order < ActiveRecord::Base
belongs_to :customer, -> { where active: true },
dependent: :destroy
end
You can use any of the standard querying methods inside the scope block.
So, adding a select method to the above scope, with the list of fields you want retrieved will do the trick.