Money Helps People Lose Weight
Money Helps People Lose Weight
“The Biggest Loser” television show is living proof that money helps people lose weight. However, most people don’t have the opportunity to make $250,000 to encourage them in their weight loss program. Leslie John and colleagues from Carnegie Mellon University found that small-scale financial incentives help people lose weight, too.
Test subjects deposited their own money in an account, which was matched by the researchers. The results were compared with a control group that received no financial incentives. People in the financial incentive group lost an average of nearly 9 pounds in 32 weeks, compared to slightly over 1 pound in the control group. Unfortunately, people quickly regained the lost weight after the experiment was over. (Journal of General Internal Medicine, published online February 2011)
