The Biggest Loser viewers would probably agree to weight loss show feeds with inspiration. Seeing the obese competitors fight makes us feel motivated to eat better, exercise and losing weight too. Turns, this premise is half correct - at least a study which concluded that people can actually eat more people overweight after seeing.
"See someone overweight led to a temporary decrease in a person felt commitment to its goal of health", wrote authors of the study Margaret c. Campbell and Gina s. Mohr, of the University of Colorado at Boulder (which is also the most active city in the United States).
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But why? It has to do with the stereotype "activation", says the study. When people are exposed to members of groups that have stereotypes attached to them, good or bad - as the fat people eat a lot, or Asians are good in math - they become more likely to act in a manner that is consistent with this stereotype. "For example," the authors write, "scores college students' general knowledge issues increases after exposure to a Professor, but decreases after exposure to a Top Model." This is true, even if stereotypical behaviour is negative, and even if it is contrary to the values of the person.
This theory falls to a phenomenon that recent studies have identified the "contagion effect" of obesity, which suggests that people who have fat friends are more likely to take the weight too. TIME reported on the study of 2007 seminal by Dr. Nicholas Christakis, Professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and James Fowler, a political scientist at the University of California, San Diego:
according to their analysis, when the participant in a study became obese friendthe first participant had 57% more likely to become obese himself. In pairs of persons in which each identified the other as a close friend, when a person become obese, the other had 171% better chance of following action. "We are what we eat is not the end of the story," says Fowler. "" "". You are what you and your friends eat. ?...(Incidentally, the contagion effect also works with weight loss, quitting smoking, and happiness, Christakis and Fowler find.)The obvious question is, why? Spouses share meals and a garden, but researchers have discovered a much smaller risk of weight - a 37% increase - when one of spouses became obese. Brothers and sisters share genes, but their influence, was too much, much more small, increasing the risk of 40%. Fowler believes that the effect has much more to do with social norms: which we expect when considering appropriate social behavior. Have fat makes friends being fat seems more acceptable. "Your spouse may not be the person that looks at when you are deciding what type of body image is appropriate, how to eat or how much to exercise," said Fowler. Nor do we necessarily compare ourselves to our brothers and sisters. "We get to choose our friends," explains. "We don't get to choose our families."
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This study suggests a different reason for the effect - activation of stereotypes social versus confirmation of social norms - which means that you should overweight people in your social network close to influence your behavior. Even a fleeting glance of unknown overweight - which occurs that more that you notice probably, considering that 67% of the U.S. population meet the clinical definition of overweight or obesity - trigger might overweight as a stereotype of behaviours such as overeating.
Campbell and Mohr set up a series of five experiments to determine the impact of the mere sight of an overweight person. In the first, researchers recruitment people walking through a lobby on the campus and showed pictures of an overweight or women of normal weight or a lamp. The respondents, average 25 years old, were asked to rate the photos for future studies (a sham task) and then were allowed to use a bowl of candy as a "thank you" for their time.
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Those who have seen the photo of the overweight woman took significantly more candy (averaging 2.2 parts) than those who have seen the normal weighted woman or lamp (an average 1.5 parts).
Subsequent experiments of researchers involved "cookie taste tests." As in the first experiment, participants were first sensitized with photos of obese and normal weight or neutral image such as a tree. Then they asked cookies rate tasting at least one (but up to eight) cookies presented on a plate. People looked at the photos of the overweight woman eating cookies significantly more than those who have been exposed to the thin woman. The difference is blocked regardless of sex or the weight of the participants.
Interestingly, however, there were certain factors which interfere with the overnutrition of induced by the fat person. An involved with photos of obese people actually eat. Although the participants ate cookies more after viewing simple portraits of obese people, they ate less when shows of overweight people eating. The difference is that the first condition only active a stereotype - probably unconsciously - while the latter more openly establishes a link between food and weight. "It may be necessary for attention to be distracted by the weight of the person," write researchers. "("If a consumer considers accession stereotype (e.g., "this person is overweight")"), the stereotype effect on... behaviour can be mitigated.".
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Another way researchers kep people eat more: simply their recall their own health goals. When the study participants were invited to write for three minutes on their objectives for health (to words of their State of origin) before eating cookies, they end up eating the same amount regardless of whether if they saw a portrait of a woman for overweight or thin.
"The results of our research are consistent with the spread of obesity through social networks", concluded researchers, whose study was published in the Journal of Consumer Research. "People see, in person and in photographs, the people with whom they have social ties." When near other are overweight, our research suggests that stereotype activation has led to increased food consumption in relation to when near other are of healthy weight since simply see that someone of excess weight may increase to eat. ?
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Advice from the author to stay on track: keep in mind. Consciously think your personal health goals before to bustling dining can help you to refrain from excess.
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