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Human HyperFormance Newsletters>
Think yourself thinner
December 19, 2007
Studies have shown that you can increase the strength in
your muscles merely by imagining that you are exercising
them. Now there’s a study that shows you can lose weight
by using the power of the mind.
Harvard psychologist Ellen Langer and student Alia Crum
took 84 maids who worked at 7 matched hotels and measured
their basic fitness levels, which showed them to be in the
relatively poor health of basically sedentary individuals.
The women did not exercise regularly, with one third saying
they got no exercise at all.
Then Langer and Crum told half of them that their work
provided them with exercise sufficient to meet the
recommendation of a half hour of exercise a day, and rated
specific housecleaning activities by calories burned per
hour. This information was posted in the maids’ lounge to
remind them. The uninformed maids at the matched hotels
did not get this information.
A month later, the average informed maid had lost 2 pounds,
systolic blood pressure had dropped 10 points, and the
other measures had significantly improved.
The finding was reported in the February issue of
Psychological Science.
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