Long-term effects of the RealFit intervention on self-esteem and food craving

ABSTRACT

Background: RealFit is a 13-week weight-reduction programme for adolescents. This study investigated the programme’s long-term effectiveness regarding the psychological outcomes of self-esteem and food craving. Methods: The study had a quasi-experimental design. Body mass index, self-esteem and food craving were assessed at baseline (T₀), immediately after RealFit (T₁), and after five months (T₂) and one year (T₃) of follow-up. Control participants (n = 32) were overweight adolescents who received no treatment. Results: Comparison between the intervention (n = 86) and control groups showed a significant difference for the self-esteem domain of global self-worth (1.63; 95% confidence interval: 0.28 to 2.99) in favour of the intervention group. The differences regarding overall self-esteem and the physical appearance domain showed a trend towards improvement. No significant difference was found for food craving. Conclusions: Taking all results and limitations into account, it may cautiously be concluded that RealFit has beneficial long-term effects on some domains of self-esteem, but no substantial effect on food craving. The appropriate duration and delivery of cue-exposure sessions in groups of overweight adolescents to decrease food craving should be investigated to further improve the RealFit intervention.

KEYWORDS:

• Overweight/obesity
• adolescents
• treatment
• self-esteem
• food craving

Conflicts of interest

Maria Jansen was involved in the development of RealFit and Sandra Mulkens developed the psychological component of RealFit.

Additional information

Funding

This study has been supported by a grant of the Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research (TNO), Netherlands Institute for Sport and Physical Activity (NISB) and the Mulier Institute, Centre for Research on Sports in Society. These agencies had no role in the design, conduct, or data analysis of this study.