by Barbara Bronson Gray
. Health reporter
Best Supplements For Men For Weight Loss - Competitive Cash-for-Weight-Loss Plans Work Best: Study
Tuesday, April 2 (Health News) - Paying people to lose weight, but some kind of competition or group effort can make it even better, a new study reports.
The survey showed how two weight loss programs sponsored by the company produced different results depending on how the rewards were structured.
The study, published on April 1 in Annals of Interny Medicine magazine, demonstrates that when it comes to designing programs to help employees lose weight, details about how incentives are offered and how much money is to get a great difference. In short term results.
Weight loss sustainability carried out in such efforts remains clear, however.
In a group of five participants, the prize to meet an individual weight loss goal was $ 100, no more or less. In another, with five members, the award was $ 100, but with a chance for more if other members are not successful. The last group had almost three times the weight loss as first.
DR. Jeffrey Kullgren, the main author of the study and an assistant professor of internal medicine at the University of Michigan, if interested in motivating people to lose weight of his work as a practitioner. "I realized that the change of behavior is very difficult," he said. With more than 80% of large employers who think about offering some form of financial incentives to help people modify risk factors, he said it was important to see what actually works.
"Much innovation is happening without much evidence," Kullgren said. "The trains left the station, so we're trying to make sure [Programs] help people get where they need to be."Your research follows in the jumps of a study, presented last month at the annual meeting of the American College of Cardiology in San Francisco, who showed those who received $ 20 per month for spilling four pounds - or had to pay $ 20 For not losing weight - they were more likely to achieve weight loss goals.
The study by Kullgren involved 105 employees of the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, between the ages of 18 and 70 years and considered obese. The goal for all to be missing a pound per week.
The researchers studied two types of incentive strategies: a group incentive and an individual. In the individual approach, employees were offered $ 100 for each month, they reached or exceeded weight loss goals. For another, groups of five employees were offered $ 500 per month to be divided equally among members who have found their goals. Those who did not find their goals did not receive money. Five-members groups had no way of learning one another, so they could not intentionally attempts or discourage in an effort to personally win a larger part of the pie.
The potential initial cost for an employer was the same for any strategy. A control group was created to compare the two strategies for the one in which people had no financial incentive. These participants received a link to a national weight control site along with monthly weighing supported by e-mail or text reminders.
After 24 weeks, participants in the group incentive plan lost more than 7 pounds on average than those who were in the individual plane, and an average of almost 10 pounds more than those in the control group. Twelve weeks after the program ending, those in the group incentive plan maintained more weight loss than those in the control group, but not more than those of the individual incentive plan.
What is the psychology behind the results of the study? Price matter, said Jason Riis, who wrote an editorial that accompanies the research. "Any amount of money constantly at stake every month - a goal and a reward - seems to be a mechanism to help people make decisions slightly better," said Riis, an assistant business administration professor at Harvard Business School.
.For those who do not have access to employer-based programs, Riis suggested that people create incentives between them and friends. He recommended Stickk.com, created by a professor of Economics at Yale University who created the idea of opening an online commitment store. "
Participants sign contracts forcing them to achieve their personal goals, such as losing weight, with the risk of a financial penalty if they fail.
Whatever the approach, the key to maintaining long-term weight loss remains indescribable, Riis said. "We're a long way to know the answers for this," he said.
