Body Perception and Effective Weight Loss

If you’ve ever been tempted to call those four flights of stairs a strength-training session or label dashing to and from your car on a rainy day as interval training, you’re not alone. Research published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition suggests that young women tend to overestimate levels of physical activity, especially if they are overweight. Study participants who were overweight overestimated activity levels 49% more often than woman who had never been overweight.

The trend applies to men and older adults, too. In a similar study published in Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, University of South Carolina researchers compared self-reported levels of physical activity for 71 overweight, but otherwise healthy, middle-age adults to data collected from wearing an accelerometer for 7 days. Study results showed that all the men overestimated minutes spent exercising per day.

What’s behind the disconnect? “People often choose exercise that they hate, so each minute of it seems much longer than it actually is,” Castillo explains. “People want instant results that exercise doesn’t give. They want to be able to run on the treadmill for 30 minutes and lose 5 pounds by the next day. This unrealistic expectation leads them to exaggerate their effort and to quit.”

To get back on track, Castillo recommends finding an exercise that you like and measuring your progress by time or miles instead of by pounds. To get started, check out Fitbie’s Exercise and Workout Finder.