NIDA researchers explain food addiction by showing how overeating can lead to changes in the dopamine pathways of the brain, and showing how these changes alter our ability to regulate impulses to eat

From the perspective of an MRI scanner, food addiction and drug addiction look similar.

Numerous brain imaging experiments have shown that drug addiction and food addiction lead to very similar changes to the functioning of the brain’s dopamine systems. Based on this, researchers at the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) have developed a neurological model to explain how brain changes can lead to very unhealthy eating (food addiction).

Beyond eating from hunger, people eat to feel pleasure – and when we look at things at the neural level, we can see that eating highly palatable foods leads to activation of the brain’s reward circuitry, similar to the activation that is seen with the use of drugs and alcohol, along mesolimbic dopamine pathways.

Drug users who repeatedly stimulate these dopamine reward systems cause changes to the functioning and structure of the brain and these changes lead to behaviors and experiences which characterize addiction, such as compulsive drug taking, an exacerbated emotional response to drug cues (triggers and cravings) and a lessened ability to inhibit behaviors (an inability to resist urges to use). Addiction is considered a brain disease because of these neural changes which lead to compulsive negative behaviors.

In the NIDA food addiction model, vulnerable* people who repeatedly consume large amounts of highly palatable sugar or fat laden foods also over-stimulate dopamine reward systems and  cause structural and functional changes to the brain which lead to a heightened response to food cues, compulsive eating and an inability to regulate intake.

*As some people experience food as more rewarding than others, are less able to resist temptation to eat appealing foods even in the face of potential weight gain and develop greater conditioned responses to food cues – some people are known to be more vulnerable to develop food addictions than others.

The Dopamine Model of Food Addiction

According to their model, people with food addiction and drug addiction have altered functioning across 4 basic types of brain processes and this altered functioning can be explained by changes to the structure and workings of various areas of the brain. The 4 brain processes altered by both food and drug addiction are:

1. Changes to reward and salience function
2. Changes to motivation and drive functions
3. Changes to learning and conditioning functions
4. Changes to inhibitory control and emotional regulation functions

Reward and Salience Functions

The brain’s reward and salience functions control how we pay attention and respond to positive and negative reinforcers in our environment.

People with food addictions show changes in the workings of this circuit to the effect that they are less able to successfully choose behaviors that will lead to long term positive outcomes and to avoid behaviors that will lead to long term negative consequences.

Food addiction altered reward and salience functions lead people to focus highly on the potentially rewarding aspects of eating and to rank the rewarding feelings of eating above most other potentially rewarding activities, (exercise, sex, etc.). This is very similar to how a person with an alcohol addiction learns to rank the rewarding feelings of alcohol above most other rewarding feelings. Since all people seek rewarding activities, it is not surprising that people who consider eating to be the most rewarding activity are prone to over-eating.

People with food addiction are also less able to focus on the negative aspects of their behaviors. Although an obese person might know of the health consequences of overeating, at the moment of eating the salience of these negative consequences is greatly overpowered by the salience of the potentially rewarding feelings associated with eating some highly palatable food.

So changes to the reward/salience circuit of the brain lead a person with food addiction to rank the pleasures of eating highly palatable foods above other pleasures and to lose the ability to effectively weigh the potential negative consequences of overeating against the likely positive rewarding consequences of eating something tasty.

Brain imaging studies have shown that people with food addiction show differences in the ventral pallidum, medial OFC and hypothalamus which likely account for the changes to the workings of the reward/saliency circuit.

Changes to Memory and Conditioning Functions

The repeated over-consumption of large quantities of highly palatable foods leads to changes in the way the memory and conditioning circuit in the brain functions.

Once food addiction changes the memory and conditioning circuit, exposure to food triggers an emotional memory and the expectation of a pleasurable reward. Exposure to stimuli associated with eating, such as the sight of a fast food restaurant, or sitting down to watch TV can also trigger emotional conditioning and a strong desire for a pleasurable reward.

These persistent emotional memories help to explain the cravings a food addict experiences for ‘pleasurable’ high density foods. Because food cravings are triggered by so many associative stimuli they can emerge with frequency and they can lead to binge eating even among people who are trying to change their eating behaviors.

Brain imaging studies show changes to the hippocampus, amygdala and dorsal striatum which explain the alteration of the functioning of memory and conditioning circuits.

Changes to Inhibitory Control and Emotional Regulation Circuits

People addicted to food show dopamine related changes in the dorsalateral prefrontal cortex, the orbitalfrontal cortex and the cingulated gyrus, all areas which are involved in emotional regulation and our ability to exercise impulse control.

Changes to Motivation and Drive Functions

Food addiction caused changes to the orbitalfrontal cortex, the dorsal striatum and the supplementary motor cortices cause an amplification in the drive to obtain food.

Studies show that when obese people are presented with a meal there is greater activation in prefrontal areas of the brain than is seen when leaner people are presented with that same meal and other studies have demonstrated that showing food cues to obese subjects will induce activation of the prefrontal cortex and the experience of food cravings.

When brain changes result in increased food cravings and an increased drive to get food and when this occurs in parallel with a high expectation for pleasure through conditioned memories, a decrease in the ability to weigh possible negative consequences and a decreased ability to inhibit eating , it is not surprising that food cravings often lead to compulsive eating and it explains in part why some food addicts will continue to eat even when they no longer describe the behavior as pleasurable.¹

Learn how to calculate your BMI Score. Although far from perfect, the Body Mass Index (BMI) score is used to determine what obesity category you fall into.

The Body Mass Index is a scale which compares your height to your weight to produce a numeric score.

• People who score under 18.5 are considered underweight
• People who score between 18.5 and 24.9 are considered to be at a healthy weight
• People who score between 25 and 29.9 are considered to be overweight
• People who score over 30 are considered obese
• People who score between 35 and 40 are considered highly obese
• People who score over 40 are considered extremely obese

How to Calculate Your BMI Score

To calculate your BMI score you divide your weight in kilograms by the square of your height in meters.

• To convert pounds to kilograms you divide by 2.2. For example, a 200 pound person would be 90.91 kg…200/2.2=90.91
• To convert inches to meters you multiply by 2.5 and then divide by 100. So a 6 foot tall person would be 72 inches tall, or 1.8 meters tall…72x2.5=180…180/100=1.8

A person who was 6 feet tall and 200 pounds would then calculate their BMI score by computing:

90.91/1.8x1.8=28.1

A person who is 6 feet tall and weighs 200 pounds has a BMI score of 28.1 and is considered overweight.

BMI Score and Disease Risk

According to the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute, you can determine your obesity related disease risk by factoring together:

1. Your BMI score
2. Your waist circumference
3. Your personal risk factors for obesity related diseases

Having a waist size greater than 35 inches for women and greater than 40 inches for men increases the risks of obesity related disease, such as type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease, as does having one or more personal risk factors, such as:

• Hypertension
• High HDL or low LDL cholesterol levels
• High blood sugar levels
• High triglyceride levels
• A family history of premature heart disease
• Being a smoker¹

Limitations of the BMI Score

As a simple tabulation the BMI score does not always effectively indicate obesity related health risks.

• Because muscle weighs more than fat and because athletic people can accumulate significant healthy lean muscle mass, an active person might have a high BMI score but a very low body fat percentage. In this situation, a high BMI score does not confer the health risks typically associated with obesity.
• Conversely, because some elderly people will lose a large percentage of lean muscle mass, some older people who score within a normal BMI range may actually have an unhealthy body fat percentage.
• People of different racial backgrounds may have different obesity related health risks; because of this some nations have set different cut-off standards for the onset of obesity. In Japan, people with a score of 25 or higher are considered obese and in China people with a BMI of 28 or more are considered likewise.²

Image Copyright: Incurable_Hippie

Worried about the compulsive nature of your relationship to food? Take this very quick quiz and see if you might meet the diagnosis for food addiction.

Not everyone agrees, but according to the experts at Yale’s Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity, food addiction is real - and it’s dangerous.

Wondering if your relationship with eating is compulsive or addictive in nature?

Well, answer the following questions honestly and find out more about why you eat and maybe learn more about what you’ll need to do to overcome unhealthy patterns of eating.

Food Addiction Self Test

The following questions are based on questions used in The Yale Food Addiction Scale. The Yale Food Addiction scale is a clinically tested reliable and valid scale used to identify people who demonstrate addiction-like behaviors towards high fat or high sugar foods.¹

This informal self test is not a clinically validated diagnostic tool but it is based on a validated and reliable diagnostic test.

If you find yourself answering yes to one or more of the following questions you may want to consult an expert to more formally investigate your emotional and psychological relationship with food.

1. Do you often lose control of your eating – eating much more of certain types of food than you had intended on (meaning to have a bowl of chips but ending up emptying that whole jumbo sized bag, for example)?
2. Do you often keep eating certain types of food even after you are no longer hungry?
3. Do you sometimes eat to a point where you feel physically sick?
4. Do you often feel tired or sluggish because of your overeating?
5. Do you often find yourself making special trips to the store to buy fatty or sugary foods, even when there are other foods in the house that would sate your hunger?
6. Do you ever find that you spend so much time eating or eat in such significant quantities that your eating interferes with ability to keep up with work responsibilities, spend time with family or friends or participate in leisure activities that you enjoy?
7. Do you ever find that after overeating you need to avoid work responsibilities, spending time with friends or family or participating in leisure activities that you enjoy so that you can deal with the negative feelings that arise from your overeating?
8. Do you ever avoid professional or social functions because you are worried that you will overeat certain foods while there?
9. Do you ever avoid professional or social functions because you are worried that certain foods will not be there?
10. Do you ever feel withdrawal symptoms like anxiety or agitation when you try to reduce or eliminate your consumption of certain foods (not including caffeinated beverages)?
11. Do you ever eat as a way to stave off developing feelings of anxiety or agitation (not including caffeinated beverages)?
12. Do you find that you crave certain types of foods (fatty or sugary foods) when you try to reduce your consumption of these foods?
13. Do you feel very worried or distressed about the way you eat or about your relationship with food?
14. Does the way you eat cause you problems in your ability to function effectively in your daily life (because of health problems, time required to eat, inability to meet obligations etc.)?
15. Have your eating habits caused you any physical health problems, or have they worsened an existing problem?
16. Do you find that you need to consume greater and greater quantities of certain foods to feel the same pleasure or satiety that you used to feel with smaller amounts of the same foods?
17. Do you find that eating fatty or sugary foods provides less pleasure or release from negative emotions than it used to?²

So how’d you score?

While this test is not a clinically valid diagnostic, the more yes answers you scored the greater the likelihood you have an unhealthy relationship with food and would benefit from meeting with a professional for a valid diagnosis of the problem and to discuss options towards a healthier eating future.

Image Copyright: Stefan

Chronic stress causes brain changes that lead us to crave comfort foods and to actually strive to increase abdominal fat stores – it’s our unconscious mind working against our best intentions! Learn more about how and why stress leads to weight gain and get some tips on things you can do right now to reduce your stress load.

Ever tried to soothe stress with ice cream?

Well, if you haven’t you’re in the minority, because there is just something about pressure-filled days that seems to leave us craving the soothing rewards of fatty and sugary foods.

Unfortunately, as our days get busier and our jobs ever more stressful, this type of coping response too often produces a very undesirable consequence – weight gain and obesity.

But is it as simple as this? Do we get fat just because we comfort eat to soothe feelings of stress, or is there more to the story?

It turns out that stress leads us to comfort eat as a way to manage anxiety and that chronic stress also causes changes to the way the body stores fat.

1. Frequent comfort eating can pack on the pounds, but resisting urges to comfort eat can be tough, and it’s not a simple matter of will power either. Chronic stress leads to changes in the brain that make us crave certain types of food – and the brain learns to use the pleasures of certain types of food to regulate some of the negative consequences of an overabundance of circulating neural stress hormones.

2. Chronic stress also seems to change the regulation of fat cells, causing the growth of more and larger fat cells, particularly around the abdomen. As a consequence of this, two people might eat the same number of calories per day, but the chronically-stressed one of the pair would end up with a much larger belly than his more relaxed counterpart.

We Comfort Eat to Relieve Feelings of Stress

It makes intuitive sense that we would turn to foods that provide moments of pleasure when feeling overwhelmed with life, but are we really as conscious of the choices we make as we think we are?

If you’re stressed out – the answer is probably not.

Chronic stress leads to changes in the brain’s neurochemistry. While under chronic stress your brain is bathed in high levels of steroids called glucocorticoids (GCs). Some of the effects of chronic high levels of GCs include:

• Increased activity in the brain’s emotional center, the amygdala – leading to decision making made more on the basis of emotion than on higher executive thinking.¹
• Increased salience for compulsive or pleasurable activities – when chronically stressed, the brain comes to pay more attention to potentially gratifying activities, such as eating sugary or fatty foods.  The real world result of this, for example, is that a fast food commercial has much more impact on you when you’re feeling chronically stressed than it would otherwise – with increased salience for pleasurable foods, the chronically stressed brain is very attuned to environmental food cues and the presence of food cues can result in strong food cravings.
• A drive to increase abdominal fat stores – at an unconscious level, when chronically stressed we may overeat as a way to increase abdominal fat. High levels of abdominal fat reduce catecholamine levels in the brain stem and result in decreased activity in the chronic stress response network. So at the biological level, we are driven to get fatter around the middle as a way to reduce feelings of anxiety related to chronic stress.²

So though on one level you always choose what you eat, when you’re chronically stressed hidden biological forces guide you toward making food-choices that help to reduce anxiety - and it all happens far below the level of consciousness.

When Stressed – The Body Gets Better at Making Fat

When chronically stressed, we turn unconsciously toward comfort eating – and we also get better at turning the calories we do eat into fat stores on the body.

Chronic stress causes an increase in a fat regulating chemical in the body called neuropeptide Y (NPY). Increased NPY levels cause a person to increase their numbers of fat cells and for existing fat cells to grow larger.³

Cut Stress to Shed Pounds

Don’t let stress sabotage your weight-loss goals.

If you’re obese and know you live a high-stress lifestyle you have to concede that your lifestyle works against your ability to manage your weight.

If you’re serious about weight loss, you have to be serious about stress reduction too.

Here’s a quick list of stress reduction/management tips for whenever you’re ready to get started!

10 Ways to Cut Stress (to Lose Weight)

1. Look for the positives in any situation and don’t dwell on the negatives
2. Get enough sleep
3. Get some physical exercise every day
4. Take time each day to do something you enjoy
5. Cut down on alcohol, coffee and cigarettes
6. Practice deep breathing exercises
7. Practice meditation, yoga or a martial art
8. Make an effort to drive slowly on commutes, giving yourself plenty of time, to reduce driving stress
9. Get organized and break down overwhelming tasks into doable bits
10. Make an effort to talk socially with friends or family every day (they’ll help you keep things in perspective)⁴

Image Copyright: Amy Mctigue

A brief introduction to a 12 steps program for compulsive overeaters

Struggling with compulsive or addictive overeating?

Well, you should probably work with a health or mental health professional on a plan of healthier eating, but you might also want to check out a local Overeaters Anonymous (OA) meeting for the support and camaraderie of a group of people going through very similar trials and challenges.

Based on the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous, the OA program is free of charge and is unaffiliated with any other private or public organization. Although the OA program is spiritual in nature, it is not religious and people of any faith and belief system are welcomed.

If you have lost control of your eating then OA might fit your needs. People that have in the past benefited from OA include people with disordered eating, people preoccupied with food and people who regulate emotions with food.

OA is not a diet program and you won’t find medical, dietary or nutritional advice a component of any meetings you attend. What OA offers is acceptance and support and a message that by accepting that you are powerless to control your overeating and by seeking a spiritual answer to a physical problem that abstinence from overeating is possible - one day at a time.

The 12 Steps of Overeaters Anonymous

1. We admitted we were powerless over food — that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong, promptly admitted it.
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these Steps, we tried to carry this message to compulsive overeaters and to practice these principles in all our affairs.¹

Image Copyright: Meredith_Farmer

An overview of some of the evidence supporting the still controversial concept of food addiction – evidence from behavioral studies as well as from animal model and neurological research.

Can a person really get addicted to food like they can to drugs or alcohol?

A growing body of research suggests that highly palatable foods work very similarly in the brain to substances like drugs or alcohol and that in some cases, susceptible people are at risk of developing food addictions.

In fact, a recent snowballing of findings supporting the concept of food addiction led the director of The National Institute of Drug Abuse (NIDA) Nora Volkow to comment this year that, "The data is so overwhelming the field has to accept it. We are finding tremendous overlaps between drugs in the brain and food in the brain."

What is this evidence on food addiction that researchers find so compelling?

The evidence supporting food addiction falls into three basic categories:

1. Behavioral evidence (people addicted to food and to drugs act display similar types of behaviors)
2. Animal model studies
3. Neurological studies

Behavioral Evidence Supporting the Idea of Food Addiction

People addicted to food display similar behaviors as people addicted to drugs or alcohol, including some which are traditionally used to diagnose the presence of substance addictions, such as:

• Continuing to overeat despite suffering negative consequences from their behaviors
• Experiencing cravings for certain types of foods (fatty or sugary foods, for example)
• Recognizing problematic eating patterns and trying to cut down, but being unable to¹

Although it ‘s hard to understand how a person can get addicted to food, especially since food addiction seems a relatively new phenomenon, it is worthwhile to note how much the food we eat has changed over the last few decades. Today’s grocery shelves are laden with products unknown to consumers of even recent decades and a significant percentage of these new products are highly processed and engineered to be highly palatable through the use of large amounts of sugar, fats, sodium and other food addictives.²

• People addicted to food are generally addicted to ‘hyperpalatable foods’. These foods tend to be highly processed and contain much higher quantities of fat, sugar or sodium than typically found in less refined or more natural foodstuffs.

Animal Model Studies

Rats Given a Choice between Cocaine and a Very Sweet Solution Choose the Sweetness

Researchers in Bordeaux did an animal study using rats that could press a lever to receive either an IV cocaine infusion or a small amount of a very sweet solution.

The rats preferred the sweet solution over the cocaine, even when they had grown to be cocaine dependent. Although previous animal studies have shown that animals will choose cocaine over food, even when they are starving to death, the researchers note that the food typically offered in other studies was not comparable to the super sweet solution used in their research study.

The study authors also note that humans have evolved to seek out sweet tastes. Having taste receptors for sweetness and enjoying feelings of reward after consuming sweet and energy dense foods likely offered an evolutionary advantage in a natural world with scarce naturally sweet foods available. They postulate that because today’s diet can be very heavily loaded with sugars and because this can lead to a super-activation of food reward mechanisms that it is not surprising that some people would experience compromised neural self control regulation and addictions to food.³

Neurological Studies

So people with potential food addictions behave similarly to people with chemical addictions and animals seem to get addicted to highly palatable foods just like they get addicted to highly rewarding drugs, but is it really the same thing at all? At the neural level, can food really be doing the same thing to our brains as drugs like alcohol or cocaine?

Well, neuroscientists don’t yet claim to have a complete understanding of all the processes that contribute to the formation and maintenance of an addiction, but based on what they do know, the answer seems to be a qualified yes – highly palatable foods seem to do similar things to the brains of people with food addiction as drugs and alcohol do to the brains of people with chemical addictions.

For example:

Milkshakes Cause Similar Neural Activation among Food Addicts as Drugs Do for Those with Chemical Addictions

Yale University researchers gave lean and obese study subjects an assessment to measure for food addiction. These subjects where then given MRI scans while they anticipated a chocolate milkshake and while they drank the chocolate milkshake.

During the anticipation phase, people who scored high on measures of food addiction had high activation in areas of the brain that are associated with motivation and reward, such as the anterior cingulate cortex, medial orbitofrontal cortex, amygdala, dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and the caudate. This is very similar to what is seen when drug dependent subjects are shown drug cues and anticipate drug use and it helps to explain why people with food addictions can have a tough time overcoming food cues.

Also, while drinking the milkshakes, study subjects who scored very highly on measures of food addiction had less activation in areas of the brain that regulate inhibition.

What seems to happen is that consuming a small amount of highly palatable food causes the brain to reduce activation of areas of the brain that work to inhibit our impulses (for example, though you might have an impulse to eat a chocolate bar, you can usually inhibit this urge if you know you are trying to lose weight). This could be a neurological explanation to partially explain food binging and it is also something (drug priming) that is seen in people with substance addictions.

So when thinking about food, people who scored highly on measures of food addiction have much greater activation in areas of the brain that focus on motivation and achieving rewarding stimuli, and when consuming highly palatable food, people with high food addiction scores have much less activation in areas of the brain that control impulses.⁴

Why Does Research on Food Addiction Matter?

Obese people who are also addicted to food may not respond well to traditional methods of encouraging weight loss and weight management. If food addiction is real, then it is important to develop ways to identify people with the disorder and to develop pharmaceutical and psychotherapeutic tools to help people manage food cravings and to control binging and compulsive overeating. ⁵

Image Copyright: Foltzwerkp

Are you overweight? You surely know that by eating less and exercising more you’d probably lose weight – but are you aware of the more subtle causes of weight gain – like your sleeping habits, the medications you use and your sex and age? Read on to find out what’s making you fat and get a better sense of what’s needed to lose those extra pounds.

If you have a body mass index score of greater than 25 you are overweight and if you score higher than 30 you’re obese – and if you’re overweight or obese you’re hardly alone, since an overwhelming majority of Americans fall into at least one of these categories.

But why are so many of us so heavy and why is it so hard to lose that extra fat?

At the most basic level, obesity occurs when, over time, a person consumes more calories than she expends. Simple stuff…

It’s not hard to understand, but if you’ve ever tried to lose that weight that plagues you then you know that while the answer may be simple; achieving lasting weight loss is anything but easy.

With that in mind, let’s take a quick look at the 10 factors that may be sabotaging your good intentions – 10 things that can cause you to inadvertently eat more than you should or that may be causing you to burn less calories per day than you’d ideally want to.

The 10 Subtle Causes of Obesity

1. Lack of Sleep

People who get less than 7 hours of sleep per night may trigger hormonal changes which increase appetite¹

2. Inactivity

Exercise burns calories, but getting regular exercise also builds lean muscle mass, which leads to a quicker resting metabolism. Exercise also helps to decrease hunger and boost mood, which can reduce the odds of eating for pleasure’s sake alone.

3. Age

Younger people have greater caloric needs than older people. Older people do not metabolize calories as quickly and older people require fewer calories each day per pound of body weight.

4. Sex Differences

On average, women have slower resting metabolisms than men do. A woman’s resting metabolism will slow even further after menopause.

5. Pregnancy

Pregnancy results in very natural and essential weight gain. This weight, much of it from increased fat stores, can be hard for many women to lose afterwards, especially during a period when the energy and time demands of new motherhood can make increasing physical activity difficult.

6. Food and Lifestyle Choices

Obviously, your habits and choices contribute to either eating sensibly or excessive eating. Lifestyle choices associated with weight gain include

• Eating fast foods or highly processed foods (these foods tend to be very high in fat, sugar and salt)
• Frequent high calorie snacking (eating chips in front of the TV)
• Frequently choosing refined carbohydrates (white bread, pasta etc.) over whole grains, fruits and vegetables
• Frequently eating out in restaurants (portions tend to be larger than you need, you don’t control the fat or sugar added, you may be tempted to add a starter and dessert etc.)
• Excessive alcohol use – alcohol is very high in calories²
• Consuming high calorie beverages (soft drinks etc.)
• Skipping breakfast
• Eating most of your calories at night

7. Your Genes

Your genetic makeup can increase your likelihood of obesity. If your biological mother is heavy as an adult you have a 75% chance of also being heavy. If your biological mother is at a healthy weight as an adult you have a 75% chance of also having a healthy weight as an adult. Studies show that adopted children are more likely to mimic the weights of their biological parents than their adopted parents; proving that this effect is genetic and not environmental in nature.³

8. Medical Conditions

Certain medical conditions are associated with weight gain, such as:

• Prader-Willi syndrome
• Cushing's syndrome
• Polycystic ovary syndrome
• Arthritis (can lead to decreased mobility/activity)
• Depression

9. Medications

Certain medications can lead to weight gain, such as:

• Some antidepressants
• Some blood pressure medications, such as beta blockers
• Anti-seizure medications
• Medications for heartburn, such as Prevacid and Nexium
• Diabetes medications such as Diabeta and Diabinese⁴
• Corticosteroids such as prednisone
• Antipsychotics

10.  Psychological Problems

Certain psychological conditions, such as binge eating disorder, can lead to obesity. People who use food as a way to manage negative emotions are also at increased risk of obesity.

Image Copyright: Charles Williams

Is your son or daughter overweight or obese? If so, then you’ve got to be on the lookout for weight-based victimization and do your best to counteract the stigma of obesity with proactive measures in the home and within the family. Here are 7 ways to get started.

Unfortunately, overweight and obese children and teens endure weight-based stigma and bias on a daily basis; and tragically, the consequences of weight-based teasing and victimization can be severe:

Sixty percent of highly obese children and teens report being victimized at school and this victimization greatly increases the odds of co-occurring depression, body image disorders and low self esteem.

• Youth who are victimized about weight are 2 to 3 times as likely to exhibit suicidal thoughts or behaviors.
• Obese children are more likely to be socially ostracized and less likely to be chosen as a friend
• Overweight and obese children and teens who are teased about their weight are more likely to develop binge eating disorder and to engage in unhealthy methods of weight control

As a parent to an overweight or obese child or teen you can’t protect them from all weight-based stigma and victimization, but you can do a lot to help your child cope with any maltreatment. Here are 7 ways that you can counteract the effects of weight based stigma and victimization

7 Ways to Counteract Weight-Based Stigma and Victimization

1. Check Yourself First – Are You A Source of Stigma?

34% of overweight boys and 47% of overweight girls report being teased or victimized about weight in the family home.¹

Is your home a stigma free zone? Check yourself to make sure that you’re not unintentionally contributing to the problem through the inadvertent communication of weight stigma messages.

Do you ever make judgments about a person’s character based on weight? Do you think fat people are less intelligent, lazier or greedier than people of a healthy weight? If you answered yes to any of the above questions, you should think hard about the accuracy of the stereotypes you rely on and about whether or not your beliefs are contributing to a problem in the home.

2. Get Educated about Obesity and Pass That Info Along

Obesity is not a simple condition caused by a single, easy to change behavior.

Obesity is caused by the interplay of environmental, genetic, biological and behavioral factors. Understanding the complexity of the situation puts you in a better position to move towards a healthier weight and to gain more acceptance about why you, or your children, may struggle with obesity.

3. Think about the Language You Use to Describe Weight and Appearance

Be careful about the language you use to describe yourself and others. Words like fat and chubby have negative connotations that go far beyond the description of a physical state.

Need to lose a few pounds, don’t say, “I’m too fat”, say, "I need to lose a few pounds to get to a healthier weight."

4. Make Efforts to Lose Weight about Health and Not about Appearance

Obesity isn’t healthy, so making an effort towards achieving a healthier weight is important, but be sure to motivate weight loss for health, and not appearance benefits.

When weight loss is encouraged for appearance’s sake you may be contributing to feelings of low self worth and body image problems.

5. Help Your Child to Identify with Positive Overweight Adult Role Models

A pop culture obsession with thinness means that few overweight and obese people make it onto the TV or movie screens to serve as positive role models for overweight or obese children and teens.

Help your child to accept that weight has little to do with a person’s potential or worth by pointing out positive overweight and obese adult role models.

6. Be on the Lookout for Weight-Based Victimization

Overweight and obese children and teens are at increased risk for victimization and bullying.

Talk to your child about bullying and be on the lookout for signs of victimization.

Should you become aware of any harassment, be prepared to intervene if appropriate, or to offer coping support your child.

7. Become an Advocate against Weight-Based Stigma and Discrimination

Should you become aware of weight based victimization going on at your child’s school make an effort to educate teachers and administrators about the negative consequences of weight stigma and to encourage tolerance for people of all weights.²

Image Copyright: Pinkanabiz

Obesity had nearly tripled in the last few decades and if you’re an adult in America today that’s not overweight or obese…you are in a real minority. Read on to see more obesity statistics and to learn more about the consequences and incidence rates of one of America’s greatest health challenges.

The numbers alone tell the story well enough – America’s got a big problem with obesity, and for those afflicted (and if you combine those who are overweight and those who are obese…that’s about two thirds of us) the consequences are felt through increased health care costs, a potential decrease in quality of life and a substantially elevated risk of an early death.

Obesity Statistics

• Mississippi is the nation’s heaviest state, with a 34% obesity rate, closely followed by West Virginia (32.5%), Alabama (32.2%) and South Carolina (31.5%). Colorado is the country’s least obese state, with a still substantial 21% obesity rate. ¹
• 72.3% of American men and 64.1% of American women are either overweight or obese
• 16.9% of American children and adolescents are obese²

• Only 31.6% of all American adults over the age of 20 are at a healthy weight, with a BMI score between 18.5 and 25.
• From 1960-1992 to 2005-2006 American obesity rates nearly tripled, from 13.4% in the 60s to 35.1% in 2005
• Non Hispanic Black women are the racial/ethnic group with the highest obesity rate, at 49.6%. Asian Americans are the least obese ethnic/racial group, with an obesity rate of only 8.9%
• In America, an obese person pays an average of $1429.00 more per year for health care expenses than a person of healthy weight.
• Only 31% of American adults report participating in regular leisure time physical activity³
• Among women, obesity rates decline as personal income rises. Women with a college education are also less likely to be obese than women with some college only or a high school diploma.⁴
• People who are obese are between 50% and 100% more likely to die a premature death. The Surgeon General estimates than an annual 300 000 American deaths may be obesity caused.
• Obese people are twice as likely to have high blood pressure and over 80% of people with diabetes are either overweight or obese.

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