|
Overweight
Women
Overestimate Physical Activity
Young women, especially those who are overweight, tend to overestimate
their levels of physical activity, according to a new study.
After losing weight, however, white
women overestimate their physical activity levels to a lesser
extent. In contrast, African American women continue to overestimate
their physical activity as much as before losing weight, researchers
report.
The finding could be useful in
helping people keep the pounds off, the study's lead author told
Reuters Health.
"It can be hypothesized that women
who overestimate their physical activity may not feel the need
to be as physically active," said Dr. Gary R. Hunter of the University
of Alabama at Birmingham.
"This can be important for preventing
weight gain since we, as well as others, have previously found
that relatively high physical activity levels are important for
maintaining weight," Hunter said.
Black women tend to be less physically
active and more likely to be overweight than white women, previous
researchers has determined. Studies have also shown that people
tend to overestimate when asked how much they exercise. So Hunter's
team set out to compare black and white women's perceptions about
their physical activity.
The study included 20 white and
21 black premenopausal women who were overweight at the start
of the study, but who lost weight during the study. The trial
also included a control group of 20 white and 14 black women who
were not overweight.
The women reported their physical
activity levels before and after losing weight.
Most women, regardless of their
weight, overestimated how much physical activity they performed,
Hunter's team reports in the June issue of the American Journal
of Clinical Nutrition.
"Premenopausal women overestimate
physical activity with overweight premenopausal women overestimating
physical activity almost twice as much as normal weight women,"
Hunter said.
After weight loss, the level of
overestimation dropped dramatically in white women, so much so
that they were similar to the black and white women who had never
been overweight, Hunter noted. But African-American women continued
the same level of overestimation even after losing weight, the
study found.
"Overestimation seems to be related
to muscle function, especially muscular strength," Hunter said.
He noted that fit women tended to overestimate their physical
activity less often than women who were not as fit.
There were signs that black women,
but not white women, experienced a reduction in physical fitness
after they lost weight. Physical activity may have become easier
for white women who lost weight, so they may have perceived that
they were less active.
Because of the decline in fitness
level, physical activity may not have become any easier for black
women, which may explain why they continued to overestimate their
activity levels, according to the report.
The results of the study "support
the concept that exercise training designed to improve fitness
and especially strength fitness may be important for increasing
free-living physical activity by changing how physical activity
is perceived," Hunter said.
SOURCE: American Journal of Clinical
Nutrition, June 2004.
Reference
Source 89
For more information on how to prevent other diseases, use
PreventDisease.com's "Quick
Prevention Resources".
|
