WEIGHT WATCHERS

Weight Watchers

Abstract

Founded in 1961, with 1.5 million people from around the world attending meetings every week today, Weight Watchers has become a socially and economically significant weight loss organization with the potential to affect the lives of many people. With that in mind, this study describes and analyzes the rhetorical strategies of Weight Watchers. More specifically, this study depicts the metaphors used by Weight Watchers to describe its 2009 program, the Momentum Program. The set point model of human metabolic adaption to diet-induced weight loss has been introduced and examined considering a constant energy density in the body weight lost. Body composition analysis indicates that the ratio of fat and nonfat lost is constant for an individual but is dependent on the initial percent body fat, producing an energy density varying from individual to individual. In this study, body composition and the set point model are used to examine weight loss dynamics. Comparison is made to a Harris-Benedict (HB) based model using a nominal energy density (3500 calories/lb). However, for subjects with decreased initial body rat percentage, the HB model first underestimates then overestimates the weight loss. The crossover time and the maximum overestimate is dependent on the initial body fat percent and the percent dietary calorie reduction. A characteristic time and an energy density ratio are defined and used to calculate a maximum rate of weight loss for a given calorie reduction. The implications of Weight Watcher's use of metaphors to describe the Momentum program are discussed as a rhetorical device that reinforces notions of the docile body, mind/body duality, normalization of the ideal body, and the care of the self. Finally, the implications of the use of mixed or multiple metaphors are discussed as being neither contradictory nor complimentary.

Table of Contents

Abstract2

Introduction4

Methodology8

Body Composition And The Distribution Of Fat And Nonfat In Weight Loss9

The Personal Fat Ratio10

The Ratio of Nonfat Loss to Total Weight Loss10

The Energy Density and the Energy Density Ratio11

Discussion and Analysis11

Calculation of the Characteristic Time14

Comparing the Models in Dynamics14

Interaction of Metaphor Clusters18

Journey and Competition19

Competition and Technical Maintenance21

Task Metaphor22

Conclusion23

References25

Weight Watchers

Introduction

“Stop Dieting. Start Living.” This is the theme of the Weight Watchers Momentum Program. It is often accompanied with narratives or testimonies of everyday people who have successfully lost weight and maintained their weight loss. This kind of approach leaves people feeling that with some patience, dedication, and hard work, they can achieve long-lasting weight loss—that they can be happy and healthy, and ultimately, live life to its fullest. The alternatives of course, are to be overweight and unhappy or to diet and be unhappy (Allison, 2005).

With neither of these choices leaving room for happiness or “living,” the obvious alternative is to embrace the practices and values of a “weight watcher.” This idea, this new alternative, seems almost profound in that a traditional understanding of weight included two choices—be overweight or diet. Weight Watchers, however, offers what seems to be a new, novel alternative—a lifestyle—a way of living in which one does not have to diet or ...