Weight excess: adaptation and advantage

Rafael Tomás Cardoso

Obesity is one of the health problems more worrisome nowadays, given its high and increasing prevalence and the direct and indirect consequences it generates on health.

In spite of the numerous resources that are dedicated to its prevention and treatment, the interventions results are being weak and inconsistent, with a minimum long-term impact.

It has been shown that obesity is a complex and multifactorial problem that combines genetic, biological, environmental, sociocultural and psychological factors. Psychological factors have been the more associated with resistance to change habits in people with overweight or obesity.

In the following chapter, we will describe some of the psychological factors that are related to the development and maintenance of overweight and obesity, since only understanding the function or advantages of an inadequate way of feeding, we would improve interventions and optimize therapeutic results.