Study: weight affects outlook on exercising

A new study published in the International Journal of Obesity by the Key Laboratory of Cognition and Personality in China has found that women who are overweight are more likely to have negative connotations of exercise whereas most women of average weight associate exercise with reward.

The researchers had 13 average weight and 13 overweight women put through three MRI scans while they flashed 90 images of others exercising or doing sedentary activities. The women were asked to imagine themselves doing those activities. The results found that the overweight women were much more likely to have a negative association with the images of exercise and imagining themselves exercising. The overweight women also had less negative reactions to sedentary activities than their average weight peers.

The average weight women not only didn’t find the exercise as off-putting, but their brain activity showed they were much more likely to associate it with reward and enjoyment.

The overweight women also had less activation in the regions of the brain that manage body movement, suggesting they may have actually have a more difficult time understanding how the exercises are even done; they may have not known how to exercise.