URI study measures health risk from “weight shaming”
Data
show links between how society treats overweight people and health effects of
chronic stress
We all know that carrying extra pounds can be bad for your health. Now a
URI professor has found that how society treats overweight people makes matters
worse.
Maya Vadiveloo, assistant professor of nutrition and food sciences in the
College of Health Sciences, and Josiemer Mattei, assistant professor of
nutrition at Harvard University T.H. Chan School of Public Health, analyzed
weight discrimination data from the long-term national study, Midlife
Development in the United States.
The researchers focused on respondents who reported regularly
experiencing discrimination because of their weight. The study asked whether
they were treated discourteously, called names, or made to feel inferior.
Those
who experienced weight discrimination over a 10-year period had twice the risk
of high allostatic load, the cumulative dysfunction of bodily systems from
chronic stress, they found. That stress can lead to heart disease, diabetes,
inflammation and other disorders, increasing risk of death.
“It is a pretty big effect,” Vadiveloo, of North
Kingstown, says of the findings. “Even if
we accounted for health effects attributed to being overweight, these people
still experience double the risk of allostatic load because of weight
discrimination.”
The findings, published in the August issue of Annals
of Behavioral Medicine,expose flaws in society’s approach to weight
control, Vadiveloo says.
“The main message is to be aware that the way we treat
people may have more negative effects than we realize,” she says. “Our paper
highlights the importance of including sensitivity and understanding when
working with individuals with obesity and when developing public health
campaigns.”
People who experience weight discrimination often shun social interaction
and skip doctor visits, she notes. “There is so much shaming around food and
weight. We need to work together as a nation on improving public health and
clinical support for individuals with obesity and targeting environmental risk
factors,” she says.
For example, Vadiveloo suggests developing strategies to make healthy
foods affordable and creating safe places for people to be active.
Vadiveloo hopes to address the topic in the classroom and revisit data
from the nearly 1,000 respondents to explore whether having more social support
or positive coping strategies reduces negative health effects of weight
discrimination.
