Many people track the number of steps they take each day, but can increasing the amount lead to weight loss?

Step counting is a good way to measure activity.
(Photo by Arek Adeoye, Unsplash)

Kennesaw State professor Bob Buresh and his team of researchers have been trying to determine if increasing the number of steps you take day can help with the obesity problem in the United States. A condensed version of their findings published in The Conversation is shared below.

"Over the last decade, smartphones have become ubiquitous not just for sending texts and staying abreast of news but also for monitoring daily activity levels. Among the most common, and arguably the most meaningful, tracking method for daily physical activity is step counting.  . . . Counting steps is far more than a fad. The Department of Health and Human Services dedicated a sizable portion of its most recent physical activity guidelines to documenting the relationship between daily step counts and several chronic diseases.

"Unfortunately, the guidelines have little to say about how step counts might be used to aid in weight management, an outcome of critical importance given the high rates of overweight and obesity in the U.S. In the early 1980s, fewer than 14% of adults in the U.S. were classified as having obesity. Today, just over 40 years later, the prevalence of obesity is greater than 40% in the adult population, and current trends suggest that almost half of adults in the U.S. will be obese by 2030.

"I am a professor of exercise science at Georgia's Kennesaw State University, and our lab has been conducting studies examining relationships among step counts and a number of health outcomes.
While the evidence is clear that increasing numbers of adults are living in a chronic energy surplus that leads to weight gain, a key question is – why? What has changed so dramatically since 1980 that could explain why obesity rates have tripled? Although the American diet is likely a key contributor, a wealth of research points to a reduction in physical activity as a major culprit behind the expanding waistlines – and step counts are an excellent indicator of physical activity.

"Step counts may – or may not – lead to weight loss: A number of recent studies have looked at whether increasing step counts can lead to weight loss over a certain period of time. One large-scale study called a meta-analysis concluded that increasing physical activity by way of step counts was effective for attaining modest weight loss. However, many, if not most, studies examining the effect of exercise on weight loss report modest outcomes, with results that are variable and often disappointing.

"When it comes to health, it is important to remember that body weight does not tell the whole story. In fact, body composition is much more predictive of health status than body weight. Someone who weighs more than another person may be in better health if they have more muscle mass and a lower percentage of body fat than the other person who weighs less but has a higher proportion of body fat.

"Parsing the numbers: We have used our data to develop a model that predicts average daily step counts per unit of fat mass from body fat percentage. We believe that this model can be used to determine how much people would need to walk to achieve a specific amount of weight and body fat reduction.

"A person's body fat percentage is every bit as important as their weight. That's because how much muscle you have affects how hungry you get, as well as how many calories you burn. Muscle mass requires energy to maintain, and this requirement leads to increased appetite, which means taking in more calories." 

The Conversation is a platform for journalism by academics.