Supporting family engagement in weight management

ABSTRACT

As obesity is increasing in many countries, helping people manage their weight has become an important issue. Medical research has shown that the family context may be important to promote lifestyle changes. Our work aims at designing a collaborative environment to engage a family in support of an individual needing to manage his or her weight. This paper presents the first step in our iterative design process which aimed at collecting information about the needs of overweight and obese people, and about the type of environment they would find useful for them and their family.

REFERENCES

• 1: Christakis, N.A. and Fowler J.H. The Spread of Obesity in a Large Social Network over 32 Years. The New England Journal of Medicine, Volume 357:370--379 (2007).
• 2: Heimendinger, J., Uyeki, T., Andhara, A., Marshall, J.A., Scarbro, S., Belansky, E. and Crane, L. Coaching Process Outcomes of a Family Visit Nutrition and Physical Activity Intervention. Health Education & Behavior 34, 1 (2007), 71--89.
• 3: Leslie, E., Marshall, A.L., Owen, N. and Bauman, A. Engagement and retention of participants in a physical activity website. Preventive Medicine 40 (2005), 54--59.
• 4: Ling, K., Beenen, G., Ludford, P., Wang, X., Chang, K., Li, X., Cosley, D., Frankowski, D., Terveen, L., Rashid, A., Resnick, P. and Kraut, R. Using Social Psychology to Motivate Contributions to Online Communities. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 10, 4 (2005).
• 5: McLean, N., Griffin, S., Toney, K. and Hardeman, W. Family Involvement in Weight Control, Weight Maintenance and Weight-loss Interventions: A Systematic Review of Randomised Trials. International Journal of Obesity 27 (2003), 987--1005.
• 6: Stevens, V.J., Funk, K.L., Brantley, P.J., Erlinger, T.P., Myers, V.H., Champagne, C.M., Bauck, A., Samuel-Hodge, C.D., Hollis, J.F. Design and implementation of an interactive website to support long-term maintenance of weight loss. Journal of Medicine Internet Research, 10, 1 (2008).

INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  H. Information Systems
  H.5 INFORMATION INTERFACES AND PRESENTATION (I.7)
      H.5.3 Group and Organization Interfaces
          Subjects: Computer-supported cooperative work

Additional Classification:
  H. Information Systems
  H.5 INFORMATION INTERFACES AND PRESENTATION (I.7)
      H.5.3 Group and Organization Interfaces
          Subjects: Web-based interaction

General Terms:
Human Factors

Keywords:
family engagement, weight management website