Obesity and Psychology - Obesity and its psychological effect on people

Over 33% of Americans suffer from obesity. Obesity is not only an American problem but it is one of the common problems all over the world. What kind of psychological effects does obesity have on people?

Obesity and psychology are very closely related. Obese people tend to exhibit a certain common psychological traits after they gain weight. One of the traits that can be found is denial. Some obese people don't want to look at themselves as fat people and they don't want others to tell them that they are fat. They get very angry when somebody tries to tell them that they should have control over their weight. There are others who try to laugh about their over weight along with others so that others do not make them feel bad. But deep within they feel hurt about the whole scenario and they wish they could be slimmer. Third type of obese people will be obsessed with their over weight problem and try to do every thing possible to get rid of their fat and excess weight. Yet other group tries to blame their over eating problem on others or other things. It can be people or an event. They use projection as their defense mechanism. So we can find a variety of psychological responses from people on their obesity problem. Only a minor percentage of people try to look at the problem in a practical way and they may have some medical complications such as Thyroid related problems other hormonal imbalances which contribute to their weight related problems.

If you are using denial or projection as your defense mechanism, you will not be able to get rid of the problem because you don't do anything about solving the problem because you are either saying that there is no problem or blaming on someone else. You need to work with your mind as well when you are working with your weight related problems.