Weight misperception may lead to health problems

  • Published
  • By Merrie Schliter-Lowe
  • 60th Air Mobility Wing Public Affairs

TRAVIS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. – A new study involving active-duty members found that 42 percent of men who are overweight or obese think their weight is normal, while 81 percent of women in the normal weight range are trying to lose weight.

 

The study, published in the May-June issue of Military Medicine, also found that fewer men than women accurately perceive their weight status – 63 percent versus 78 percent – while 66 percent of overweight men and 63 percent of overweight women do not diet.

 

Inaccurate weight perceptions have potential health implications for the military, according to Lt. Col. Heidi Clark, 60th Diagnostics and Therapeutics Squadron Nutritional Medicine Flight commander and registered dietician at Travis Air Force Base, California.

 

“The concern is, if you don’t accurately perceive whether or not your weight is healthy, you’re probably not going to try and change it and you’re probably not going to engage in healthy behaviors that  would support changing it,” said Clark, who collaborated with three Army dieticians on the study, “Misperceptions of Weight Status in Military Men and Women.”

 

While it is not clear why military members over- or under-estimate how much they weigh, the researchers proposed that it may be related to “aspects of the military culture; such as weight and body composition standards, as well as an emphasis on physical fitness.”

 

Based on body mass index, about two-thirds of military members are overweight or obese, costing the Department of Defense more than $1 billion annually in direct medical treatment and lost duty time. Additionally, obesity is associated with an increased risk for chronic diseases; including diabetes, heart disease, cancer and stroke.

 

“Overweight men who think they are at an appropriate weight may be putting themselves at risk for cardiovascular disease because they feel no need to increase their physical activity, change their diet or stop eating fast food,” said Clark.

 

By the time some of these individuals are ready to retire, she said, they may be “caught off guard” when diagnosed with high cholesterol, joint pain or other weight-related problems.

 

“If you’re always borderline for high cholesterol or borderline for high blood pressure, and have a high BMI, I would say you have a health condition that should probably be better managed,” said Clark.

 

Women who diet unnecessarily may also be putting themselves at risk.

 

“They may be avoiding foods, eating too little, skipping meals, exercising excessively or doing other things that, in and of themselves, may be a health risk because they think they are over a healthy body weight or just don’t like the way they look,” said Clark.

 

While the study found that no men in the normal weight range dieted, regardless of weight perception, 29 percent of women in the normal weight range thought they were overweight, while 19 percent of them were dieting.

 

The study took several years to complete and involved 295 volunteers from Joint Base San Antonio and Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas, and Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Tacoma, Washington.

 

The study results open the dialog among dieticians about how to educate people about weight standard and how they relate to disease risks, as well as how to help members better assess their personal weight standards, according to Clark.

 

“This has opened our eyes that this phenomenon is real; it exists, at least in this convenience sample of military members,” she said.

 

However, there are several limitations of this study. First, it did not include waist circumference in weight calculations.

 

“Once a person’s waist circumference exceeds a certain amount, I can say with a fair degree of certainty that you’re carrying excess body fat around your abdomen, which is the most dangerous place to carry excess fat. If we could go back and add waist circumference, that would have strengthened this study,” said Clark.

 

Another limitation was not having a more diverse population of volunteers.

 

“People chose to participate in the study,” said Clark. “It was a decent sample size, but the majority were Caucasian, Army, enlisted and male, which doesn’t allow us to answer specific questions about what this means for minority populations.

 

“In other civilian research, there are different body acceptance standards based on cultures, ethnicities, values and acceptance in terms of weight standards and weight norms and how far those standards are from what the health community would consider appropriate. We can’t evaluate that because it was not a diverse group.”

 

Although the results of this study match the results of studies in civilian populations, the findings were based on a previous research project. “The original study looked at what motivates people to eat – emotions, social situations, stress or hunger,” said Clark.

 

“We found that people who ate intuitively – eating when you’re hungry and stopping when you’re full – tended to have a healthier and more normal body weight,” she said.

 

Information from the latest study will be included in the revised Better Body, Better Life curriculum, spearheaded by Travis dieticians. BBBL in an interactive, hands-on, five-part series focusing on nutrition, physical activity and behavioral issues to promote healthy living. Classes are held at the David Grand USAF Medical Center on Thursdays from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m.

 

For more information, contact the Nutritional Medicine Clinic at 707-423-7867.