One example comes from weight-loss researcher Rena Wing, who tells a symposium about her experiences in trying to find out what makes a person a "successful loser" in the long run.
"Successful loser" may not sound like a compliment, but it is something that many Americans would like to be, according to psychiatry Professor Rena R. Wing.
For some 34 million people in this country who are obese, losing weight is not always the biggest battle - keeping that weight off is, she said during the third annual Research Symposium on Mental Health Sciences sponsored by Brown's Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior.
"We know how to lose weight. We need to figure out how to maintain it," said Wing, who is recognized as an expert in the behavioral treatment of weight loss. What makes a "successful loser" in the long run is now the focus of her research.
The Dec. 1 symposium provided a look at the latest research being done by the sponsor's faculty, medical students, residents, postdoctoral fellows and interns. Poster presentations showcased more than 100 research projects (winners announced on page 2) and four speakers, including Wing, discussed their recent investigations. The other speakers were faculty members Henrietta L. Leonard and Richard Longabaugh, who spoke about Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and alcoholism, respectively, and keynote speaker Enoch Gordis, director of the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.
The speeches revealed a picture of the lengthy research process, of which the public usually knows only the final results.
Wing has researched the behavioral treatment of obesity since the 1970s. It is a major public health problem, as one of every three Americans is overweight. Not long ago, that statistic was one in four, Wing said.
However, as her work has demonstrated, research doesn't always lead to expected answers, but the findings are often valuable in honing the questions and developing new studies.
An example of one such study in which Wing was involved focused on assessing motivational tools to get people to exercise regularly - the single best predictor of long-term weight loss, said Wing.
The typical behavioral weight-loss program encourages people to maintain an exercise program with such tips as putting running shoes near the bed every night so that people are forced to see them when they wake up, or subscribing to a running magazine so that its regular arrival is constant motivation.
In her study, money and personal trainers were used as incentives to keep the subjects interested in exercise, said Wing. While all the test groups received the same behavioral treatment, the subjects in one group were also assigned a personal trainer; another group received a small sum of money every time they exercised; yet another group received both a trainer and money.
After six months, the group with personal trainers had completed about double the number of walks than had those who received only behavioral treatment; the same was true for those who received a financial incentive. Further, the group that had a personal trainer and financial incentives completed triple the number of walks than did the standard behavioral treatment group.
However, the results in weight loss did not correlate with the number of walks.
"We thought the group who attended the most walks would have done the most exercise and therefore would have lost the most weight," said Wing. Instead, those in the standard behavioral treatment group lost the most, said Wing. Those in the other groups all lost about the same amount of weight.
And, regardless of which group they were in, people did different amounts of exercise on their own. Those who exercised the most overall, burning about 2,500 calories a week, did the best in weight loss management over time, said Wing.
That finding, and similar data from other work in which Wing has participated, has led to her latest research.
Wing is now working on a study that examines the effect of various amounts of exercise on two groups of individuals, she said. Do those who exercise the most maintain their weight loss better over time than those who exercise in smaller amounts? Everything in the study is controlled except the amount of exercise, said Wing. One group is required to burn 1,000 calories a week, and the other group 2,500. (Walking 10 miles a week will burn about 1,000 calories.)
Many more factors surrounding the treatment of obesity still need to be researched, according to Wing. One benefit of coming to Brown this fall from the University of Pittsburgh, where she still holds a faculty position, was the opportunity to develop new research collaborations, she said.
"I think we need to all put our heads together and decide what we can do for this problem," said Wing.