Diets in groups more successful than solo diets

Main Category: Public Health
Article Date: 28 Feb 2004 - 0:00 PDT

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If you want to diet, you are more likely to succeed if you join a dieting group than if you solo diet, a new study has revealed. Joining a group is less stressful as well as being more effective.

The study was carried out at Aston University (UK) and Western Human Nutrition Center (USA).

The main advantage of the group, say the researchers, is their supportive environment.

Sadly, 90% of people who go on a diet end up putting the pounds back on.

60 women were monitored over an eight-week period.

Twenty women were not on a diet, another twenty were on a solo diet (no diet group) and the other twenty all attended the same diet group.

The solo dieters were free to choose any diet they wanted - be it the Atkins diet, the Zone, the Raw Food Diet, etc.

To measure stress, the researchers measured the amount of cortisol (stress hormone) in their saliva. Solo dieters were found to be under much greater stress than the women in the other two groups.

The women in the diet group had equal stress levels to the women who were not on a diet.

They were then asked to do simple computer tasks. The solo dieters had impaired mental performance compared to the women in the other two groups.

According to experts, the most stressful period in a woman's diet is the first two weeks. Being in a group helps them cope with this period.

Apart from the support, dieting groups offer nutritional information and a regime (structure) the women can follow.

The solo dieters lost less weight than the group dieters.

The solo dieters are also at a greater risk of not getting a balanced diet. The team spirit seems to help the group dieters along.

Obesity is a growing problem in many countries, especially in the USA and UK.

This study only looked at women and diets.