Chinese School - Black, White Women Differ on Dieting

WORLD / Health

Black, White Women Differ on Dieting

(HealthDay)
Updated: 2007-07-07 01:40

Overweight or obese white American women are more likely than their black
peers to ask for dieting assistance, such as counseling from a medical
professional, a doctor's prescription, membership in a weight-loss group,
or advice from a trainer, a new study finds.

The study authors, who surveyed 120 women in Philadelphia, also found
that body image was an important motivator for white women in seeking
dieting help but not as important to black women.

The findings are published in the current issue of the journal Ethnicity
& Disease.

"We found that African-American women did not differ from Caucasians in
terms of concerns about body shape and weight," but those concerns were
more likely to motivate white women to seek dieting assistance, said lead
author Rachel Annunziato, assistant professor in the department of
psychiatry, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York City.

Obesity-related health concerns were not cited by either black or white
women in the study as a primary motivation for losing weight.

Annunziato said cultural factors likely play an important role in
influencing whether, when, and where women seek help with dieting and the
type of assistance they prefer.

"Community-based approaches appear to be promising vehicles for promoting
weight loss in ethnic minorities; however, there is much work to be done
in terms of developing programs that improve both weight loss and
successful maintenance of weight loss," Annunziato said in a prepared
statement.

Modifying weight-loss programs to better address the needs of black women
and other minorities may be an important step.

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