Study Shows Tweeting Leads to Greater Weight Loss

Do you live, breathe, tweet? It might just be helping you lose weight. A recent study from the University of South Carolina revealed that participants lost more weight if they used Twitter frequently to communicate with others in the program.

We all know friends and social support are crucial to losing weight and maintaining it, but I find this research so interesting because it shows that social networking sites specifically can increase our weight-loss successes.

The study put 96 overweight and obese men and women in a weight-loss program that incorporated a smartphone or tablet. All participants listened to bi-weekly podcasts about weight loss and nutrition, but half also used Twitter and a diet-monitoring app. After six months, the "tweeps" who actively used the microblogging service for feedback from counselors and others lost more weight than the other group. Even cooler, the tweet activity was measurable: Every 10 posts corresponded to a half-percent more weight loss. Wow!

One thing I’ve loved seeing with my New York Times best-selling book, The Digest Diet, is how quickly an interactive, dynamic online community formed around the plan at facebook.com/digestdiet. I'd bet that the posts and status updates there make a difference in sticking with the plan too. Let me know! Tweet @LizVacc with hashtag #DigestDiet and share how you’re doing, or post at facebook.com/digestdiet, where you can also find daily advice, personal answers, and tons of social support.

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