Teens who learned to manage their emotions during a weight loss program may be better able to keep the weight off afterward.
The research has found that adding emotion management skills to a standard family-based program did not increase weight loss during treatment. It did appear to make the results last.
How the Study Worked to Balance Emotions During Weight Loss
Researchers recruited 166 teens with overweight or obesity, along with a parent for each. Half were randomly assigned to a standard behavioral program built around healthy eating, physical activity and habits such as setting realistic goals.
The other half received the same program plus training in understanding and responding to emotions. The program ran six months. Researchers then followed the teens for another year.
What Did The Research Say About Teens Weight Loss Program
Both groups lost similar amounts of weight by the end of treatment. At that point, 26% of teens in the emotion-focused group and 22% in the standard group had reached what researchers defined as a clinically meaningful amount of weight loss.
The gap opened later. One year after treatment ended, 22% of teens in the emotion-focused group had maintained that level of weight loss, compared with just 4% in the standard group.
Why Emotions Matter So Much During Adolescence
Emotion management, the ability to recognize and respond to feelings, develops during adolescence and can shape eating and activity habits. Teens who received the extra training reportedly appeared less inclined to snack as a way to ease stress or lift their mood.
“Emotional eating is one of the triggers for overeating and binge eating for many — over time, the goal is for teens to see food as one of many ways to feel better, but not the only one,” said Kerri Boutelle, PhD, professor of pediatrics and psychiatry at the Herbert Wertheim School of Public Health and Human Longevity Science at the University of California, San Diego, who led the study.
The authors stressed that the findings do not show emotion training produces bigger weight loss up front. Instead, they suggest it may make behavioral treatment more durable, which matters because keeping weight off is often harder than losing it.
The study also left a puzzle. Teens in the emotion-focused group did not show a significant difference in emotion regulation skills on a questionnaire, so it is not yet clear what drove the better results.
Possible explanations include changes in teens’ coping skills, shifts in how parents respond to their children’s feelings, or the interaction between the two.
Researchers said future studies should look more closely at what exactly helped teens maintain their weight.
