Key Takeaways
- Scientific Evidence on Daily Weighing Is Inconclusive: While some observational studies suggest that daily self-weighing may aid in weight loss, the evidence isn't definitive. A randomized controlled trial involving 183 adults found no significant weight loss attributable to daily weighing alone, especially when participants received ineffective dietary advice. This indicates that daily weighing might not be a standalone effective strategy for weight loss.
- Psychological Impacts Can Be Detrimental: Regularly stepping on the scale can lead to negative emotions, particularly if individuals equate their weight with self-worth or success. Daily weight fluctuations due to factors like water retention, hormonal changes, or digestion can cause unnecessary stress or lead to unhealthy behaviors, such as restrictive eating patterns.
- Personalization Is Key: The decision to weigh oneself daily should be individualized. For some, it may serve as a helpful tool for monitoring progress; for others, it could be a source of anxiety. Importantly, scales do not measure overall health. If you're engaging in healthy behaviors and feel well, frequent weighing may not be necessary.
The Evolution of Weighing Rituals
It’s difficult to say when our obsessions with scales and weight began, but no doubt the last century at least has seen us caring a great deal about their measurements. Where perhaps once scales were only found in our doctors’ offices or coin operated scales outside supermarkets (yes, they really had those), today scales are extremely inexpensive and have evolved to communicate directly with our smartphones and to also measure, albeit without great accuracy, our body fat percentages.
The Science Behind Daily Weighings: Benefits and Drawbacks
While there are definitely studies suggesting weighing yourself daily is useful for weight loss, the studies looking at same aren’t as clear cut as the world wants you to believe and are almost entirely observational (rather than randomized).
A randomized controlled study that managed to isolate daily weighing as an intervention that looked at 183 adults who were all given ineffective dietary advice (meaning if they lost weight it would be attributable to their daily scale use as they weren’t given good weight loss advice) found that weighing daily had no impact on weight loss.
And those studies that do note greater losses from those who weight themselves daily? Perhaps they’re simply discovering that those who are more successfully losing weight are more likely to want to see that reinforced by greater scale use and where people who know things aren’t going so well, avoid the scale for fear of reinforcing their disappointment and frustration.
The Psychological Impacts of Daily Weighing
The challenge with scales is tied to the erroneous belief that they measure health, happiness, success, effort, and/or self-worth. And so for many traumatic dieters, stepping on them can lead to a cascade of negative emotions which in turn can derail a person’s best efforts, or alternatively, lead to highly restrictive and maladaptive thinking around food and weight.
An additional challenge is that scales can fluctuate quick a bit from day to day consequent to water retention in response to saltier foods or periods and due to constipation and clothing. While intellectually many people appreciate the existence of these fluctuations, for many, emotionally, they hit hard.
Final Thoughts
We’re all individuals. If weighing yourself frequently is something you find to be helpful and healthful, by all means, go for it. But for those who struggle emotionally with the numbers, finding a less frequent weighing routine might be wise. Again, worth reinforcing clearly here - scales don’t measure the presence of absence of health and if you’re meeting the goal of living the healthiest life you can honestly enjoy please don’t feel the need to weigh yourself at all.
