Stress Causes Weight Gain
As shown in an article in the American Journal of Epidemiology, stressing out does cause people to increase in weight. It is believed that this study is among the first of its kind to examine at the relationship between weight gain and multiple types of stress. It looked at different types of stress that included job-related demands, difficulty paying off debts, tense home life, depression or anxiety disorder.
“Today’s economy is stressing people out, and stress has been linked to a number of illnesses – such as heart disease, high blood pressure and increased risk for cancer. This study shows that stress is also linked to weight gain” as described by Jason Block, M.D., M.P.H.. Dr Block is the individual that conducted the research as a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health … Society Scholar at Harvard University. Block practices internal medicine at Brigham … Women’s Hospital and is on the faculty of the Harvard Medical School/Harvard Pilgrim Health Care.
The research points out that women’s waists are affected by a number of types of stress. As determined in the study, “Psychosocial Stress and Change in Weight Among U.S. Adults.” Along with weight gain associated with money troubles or a difficult job, women also added pounds when confronting strained family relationships and feeling limited by life’s conditions.
For men, the numbers on the scale did not increase when tackling difficult family relationships or feeling constrained by life circumstances. For men, want of decision authority at work and lack of skill discretion was associated with greater weight increases. Skill discretion can be characterised as the power to learn new skills on the job and to perform interesting job duties.
Overall, this research found that individuals who reported increased psychological stress added more weight if they already had higher body mass indexes (BMI). A related weight-gain pattern was not found among lower-weight people who were dealing with the same types of stress, as reported in the study.
When coping with life’s stressful periods, individuals may change their eating patterns, and this can lead to shifts in weight. Stress induced weight increase is influenced by an individual’s gender, the type of foods people eat when they change their eating behaviors, and whether the person is already overweight or obese. These factors may cause some individuals to put on more weight under stressful circumstances. But sometimes others may gain less weight or even lose weight when stressed.
The study recommended that stress reduction may play an important part of weight-loss programs in the workplace and in clinical and public health programs. In the workplace, access to weight-loss programs, flexible work schedules and exercise programs can help stressed-out workers.
“This is one of the first studies to explore the relationship between stress and weight gain,” Block said. “Our findings show that stress should be recognized as a threat to the well-being of adults, especially those who are already overweight.
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