Depending on your history, the bathroom scale can be your friend or your foe. And, as tempting as it is to put your head in the sand ostrich-style, a new study from researchers in Virginia suggests thinking of the bathroom frenemy in a more positive light — a visual cue that may help your weight remain steady.
One of the best pathways to sustainable weight loss is avoiding dramatic changes. Instead of worrying about how to best drop 70 pounds, the study proposed a new goal: weight stability, with small changes being more palatable for the larger population.
After assigning half of the study participants to a “small change approach,” researchers assigned the remainder to just keep an eye on their weight — no action necessary.
At first, those who were making small, active changes lost about 3 pounds, compared with the others, who lost about half a pound. But by the end of the two-year study, there was no significant difference between the two groups — or at the next check-in a year later.
Surprisingly, those who were just monitoring their weight actually lost about a pound and a half over three years. It may seem small, but the behavioral implications carry some weight — no pun intended.
This important, if incremental, change may be due to the fact that consistent body-weight monitoring is a core strategy of many successful weight loss programs, the study pointed out
Currently, just under half of adults in the United States have obesity. So while it’s not a condition addressed overnight, easy-to-implement tactics like weight surveillance have the potential to make important changes in the long run.