Peer dynamics can help or hinder the success of individual weight loss

Losing weight, one of the most common goals for self-improvement, especially during the winter months leading up to the "Beach Body" season. The way people are trying to achieve their goals may vary from one individual to another, but one of the most popular approaches is enrolling in a commercial program. weight loss that uses a "buddy system" approach to losing weight.

This is where the design of the program aims to shape and maximize a sense of community among the participants in order to have a positive impact on everyone's weight loss efforts.

So it works?

According to some recent research, this is the case, but perhaps not as most people badume.

The study to be published in the January edition of the journal INFORMS Marketing science s "Inspiration of the" big loser ": social interactions in a weight loss program" and is written by Kosuke Uetake of Yale University and Nathan Yang of McGill University in Montreal.

The study is focused on how individuals lose weight when they participate in commercial weight loss programs. The researchers' badysis included a review of data from a large US-based weight loss program involving nearly 2 million participants. The program does not explicitly limit certain food groups. Instead, it adopts a calorie budgeting system that gives participants the freedom to eat any type of food if they do not exceed their daily caloric budget.

"The use of peer effects, also known as" buddy system ", can have an impact on weight loss," said Uatake. "But this peer-to-peer dynamic can have encouraging or discouraging effects, so it's important to know what works and what does not work."

The researchers found that presenting the average weight loss among a peer group can have a negative effect on a participant's actual weight loss. More specifically, when an individual compares to his or her peer group, this can be discouraging.

On the other hand, when the results of the most successful weight loss program are presented, this can have an encouraging effect on the individual weight loss of other participants. Individuals tend to be more inspired by those who have achieved the most significant results.

"Meeting managers can use the most successful weight loss successes to inspire the group, and perhaps avoid using the success of the entire group as a reference," Yang said. "In addition, weight loss program managers can define the composition of groups so that meeting participants enjoy the encouraging effects of the best performers, while minimizing the discouraging effects of people with average performance."