Online weight-loss groups offer valuable support, comfort
Certain posts receive more responses than others, she has found. Grønning chose to analyse the diary entries of "Astrid," a very active user on the forum. "In 19 of 22 cases Astrid received positive responses when she posted confessions like, 'I've been eating sweets and drinking wine for several days.' The sociologist Erving Goffman uses the term 'saving face,' and from the responses it seems that the others in the forum know what it's like to be overweight, and they step in to help her save face," says Grønning. Supporting each other The results of the study have been published in Grønning's article, "Digital absolution: Confessional interaction in an online weight loss forum," which is part of her doctoral thesis on morbid obesity and the efforts and various processes associated with morbid obesity. She first heard about the national Norwegian weight loss forum when she interviewed people who had undergone weight ...