Factors related to attendance rates in obesity-treatment-groups

Abstract

Although the effectiveness of behaviorally-oriented obesity-treatment groups has been empirically established for some time, one continual problem, often cited, has been the high dropout rate. Previous authors have urged the investigation of possible predictive variables, but to date there have been no systematic empirical investigations.The present study elicited a large number of personal, psychological, physical, and social characteristics of persons seeking group treatment for obesity and correlated those variables with their subsequent attendance.Analyses found several variables to be significantly correlated with subsequent group attendance (number of years obese, highest grade, current age, depression score, neuroticism score, self-sufficiency score). Other interesting and significant correlations, among the variables, were elicited. A step-wise multiple regression analysis elicited two significant variables (neuroticism score and the number of years obese) which accounted for 20 percent of the subsequent attendance variance.The findings were discussed in the context of maximizing the efficiency of obesity-treatment-group programs. Theoretical and practical implications were also proposed.The effectiveness of behaviorally-oriented obesity-treatment programs has been empirically established for some time (