Attitudes that Make Weight Loss Management Difficult

Abstract

Objective: In this study we tried to find out which would be the most important attitude-related factors that make the weight loss management difficult. Methods: We discussed problems of weight loss attempts with 68 persons having tried to lose weight. 32 had been successful having managed to lose at least 5 kg of their weight permanently; they formed “the successful group”. 36 had not been successful at all, forming “the non-successful group”. We compared the amount of harmful attitudes between these groups. Results: During these discussions emerged 15 attitude-related factors that seemed to disturb successful weight loss and maintenance. These attitude-related factors were found significantly more often in the non-successful group as opposed to the successful group. The factors that seemed to disturb the attempts to lose weight were inertia (”laziness”)(IN), culinary attitude (CU), Depressive mood (DE), restlessness (RE), superiority attitude (SB), criticism (CR), bitterness (BI), food dependency (FD), experiencing general difficulties in weight loss (DI), impaired physical condition (IC), hunger (HG), incapacity (ICA), peer pressure (PP), lack of the time (LT) and unrealistic activity (UN). Statistically the most significant factors in this study were depressive mood (p=0.0018), food dependency (p=0.006), restlessness (p=0.035), bitterness (p=0.035) and inertia (p=0.23). Also one combination of three factors (criticism, experiencing general difficulties in weight loss and impaired physical condition) was statistically more abundant in the non-successful group (p=0.0299). Conclusion: During a 30 minute discussion there were found attitudes that are not beneficial to the weight loss management. The most disturbing attitudes in our study were depressive mood, food dependency, restlessness, bitterness and inertia. The existence of factors that alone were not statistically significantbetween the two studied groups became statistically significantas a combination.