1 January 2010

Psychometrics used in weight loss study

Psychometric testing may be used to help people to loose weight, it has been claimed.

Recent research suggests certain psychological characteristics may aid individuals in their efforts to lose weight while other traits may complicate the task.

Surprisingly, being too optimistic could harm weight loss efforts whilst individuals who were able to improve their self-awareness through counseling were more likely to lose weight than those who were not.

Hitomi Saito from Doshisha University, Japan, worked with a team of researchers to psychologically profile 101 obese patients undergoing combined counseling, nutrition and exercise therapy.

Their psychosocial characteristics before and after attending the clinic were assessed using psychological questionnaires designed to identify patients' personality types.

This results supports previous findings that some negative emotion has a positive effect on behaviour modification because patients care more about their disease.

However, the overall improvement in optimistic ego state is not necessarily detrimental, as this increased optimism should result in patients maintaining the healthy lifestyle achieved at the clinic.

In a report on the study, the authors say it is important to enhance patients' self-effectiveness and self-control in order to reduce psychological stress and to maintain the weight loss.

However, the weight loss should not be attributed solely to the intervention of the clinical psychologists, but to the total efforts of a holistic medical care team.

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