Using New Technologies to Promote Weight Management.

This project aims to evaluate the effectiveness of using social media to augment the delivery of, and support for, a weight management program delivered to overweight and obese individuals. One hundred and twenty overweight and obese participants from the Perth community will be enrolled in the study, and randomly divided into three groups: two intervention groups and a control group. The two intervention groups will be instructed to follow the CSIRO Total Wellbeing Diet weight-management program for the twenty four-week intervention period. The primary intervention group will receive the diet via the social networking website Facebook along with a support network on the site. Participants will complete a series of questionnaires of key psychological variables and to attend Curtin University for assessment of body weight and other clinical outcome variables at weeks 0, 6, 12, 18 and 24. The CSIRO Total Wellbeing Diet is an energy reduced, low fat, high protein diet that promotes 30 minutes of moderate physical activity per day. The research coordinator (who has a BSc (Nutr) will post the program to the Facebook Group's wall at the start of the trial. There will be no personalised feedback, but the research coordinator will post general questions relating to the program regularly (eg. In what way did you get 30 minutes of exercise today?) to facilitate discussion between the Group's members. Participants will be encouraged to check the Facebook Group at their discretion, however every time new content is posted to the Group's wall, all participants in the group will get a notification which, it is hoped, will act as a reminder for them to check in. To monitor adherence, participants will be asked to complete a three day food diary, along with physical activity and other relevant questionnaires, at weeks 0, 6, 12, 18 and 24. The research coordinator will also log in to the Facebook Group daily to check that participants are using the Group.