Offering financial incentives may help people lose weight more effectively than simply giving them access to tools like weight-loss programs, according to a new study published in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine.
When you’re trying to make any kind of major lifestyle change, staying motivated can be a challenge — especially if the potential rewards of the lifestyle change, like staying healthier in the years ahead, aren’t immediately apparent. That’s why researchers have studied different incentives for participants in studies that involve sticking to a lifestyle program, such as studies aimed at weight loss. Sometimes those incentives consist of praise or positive feedback from people administering the study, but they can also involve material rewards like financial incentives. Of course, financial incentives may be more or less effective depending on the amount of money involved, and on the financial situation of study participants. The idea behind financial incentives is that if they’re shown to be effective in a certain case, they could be incorporated into real-world situations like employer-based wellness programs or even health insurance plans.
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For the latest study, 668 adult participants with obesity who lived in low-income neighborhoods were randomly assigned to one of three groups. The average age of participants was about 48, and 81% were women. The average body weight at the beginning of the study was 99 kilograms (218 pounds). All three study groups were given the same resources to help with weight loss — including a one-year commercial weight-loss program membership, health education, monthly one-on-one check-ins with a study administrator, and tools like a digital scale and a physical activity monitor. The second group also received financial incentives tied to behaviors that promote weight loss, while the third group received financial incentives tied to the amount of weight they lost. Participants in the two incentive groups could receive up to $750.
Financial incentives linked to increased weight loss
The researchers were mainly interested in the percentage of participants in each group who lost at least 5% of their body weight. After six months, this number was 22.1% in the resources-only group, 39.0% in the behavior-based incentive group, and 49.1% in the outcome-based incentive group. The average amount of weight that participants lost, though, was similar in the two incentive groups. Members of the behavior-based incentive group earned an average of $440.44, while members of the outcome-based incentive group earned an average of $303.56 — meaning that outcome-based incentives helped achieve more weight loss for each dollar spent.
The researchers concluded that “outcome-based and goal-directed financial incentives were similarly effective, and both strategies were more effective than providing resources only” when it came to weight loss among low-income participants with obesity. Further studies, they wrote, should focus on long-term weight loss and other health outcomes, and should explore the most cost-effective ways to encourage these outcomes.
Want to learn more about weight management? Read “Losing Weight Without Feeling Hungry,” “Seven Ways to Lose Weight,” and “Tried and True Weight-Loss Techniques.”
