Who will lose weight? A reexamination of predictors of weight loss in women

Abstract

Background: The purpose of this study was to analyze pretreatment predictors of short-term weight loss in Portuguese overweight and obese women involved in a weight management program. Behavioral and psychosocial predictors were selected a priori from previous results reported in American women who participated in a similar program.

Usefulness of Standard BMI Cut-Offs for Quality of Life and Psychological Well-Being in Women

“…They were recruited in multiple contexts such as schools, worksites, and health/medical centers through flyers, newsletters, listserv/emailing, and word of mouth. Among the treatment seeking (‘clinical’) group, 811 women entered one of two behavioral weight loss programs targeting changes in physical activity and dietary habits [25,26], or volunteered to participate in a 4-month obesity prevention community-based program targeting changes in physical activity and diet [27]. Approval was obtained from the Faculty of Human Kinetics’ Ethics Committee, and all participants signed an informed consent form.…”

Psychological Factors Discriminating Between Successful and Unsuccessful Weight Loss in a Behavioral Exercise and Nutrition Education Treatment

“…Because research suggests that short-term weight loss will typically revert to baseline soon after terminating treatment [38], this method, previously used under conditions similar to this study [9,[39][40][41], was employed. It had the advantage of maximizing statistical power while not retaining data from only those with high treatment compliance or predicting changes (and imputing) based on results from participants who successfully complied [37].…”

“…The moderating effects of psychological variables on treatments' association with weight loss have, however, remained understudied. This is probably because research goals have been limited to generating hypotheses for further investigation [9]. In practice, many treatments still emphasize information in desirable nutrition practices without accounting for cognitive-behavioral factors that may well predict success or failure with requisite behavioral changes.…”

Obesity, Cardiovascular Risk Factors, and Weight Loss in a Population of Adult Mexican Americans

“…works and under what conditions) will justifiably continue to deserve attention from researchers (Teixeira et al, 2004). Given the mixed research on the potential disparate effects of weight-related interventions across levels of factors such as those aforementioned and the lack of studies in ethnic minority populations such as Mexican…”

“…The strongest predictor of success at meeting the weight loss goal was older age. Given the mixed findings of the existing literature, predicting weight loss outcomes from information collected from program participants before they start an obesity prevention or management program is an important research goal (Teixeira et al, 2004).…”