Researchers at Justus Liebig University Giessen (JLU) are testing a new approach to obesity care that focuses on well-being rather than weight loss. The pilot study is led by Prof. Ulrike Gisch, whose work engages with the broader European effort to reduce the stigma faced by people living with obesity.
People living with obesity often face prejudice in daily life, from being overlooked in job applications to encountering bias from doctors and other healthcare professionals. This kind of weight-related stigma is one of the issues Prof. Dr Ulrike Gisch, Professor of Nutritional Psychology at JLU, is working to address. Her work connects with the aims of the EUPeace Research Hub “Inclusive Health and Well-Being”, a network of European researchers working towards fairer access to healthcare.
Focusing on well-being, not weight loss
Prof. Gisch’s team has developed a pilot study called EASE, short for Experience, Awareness, Stigma Reduction and Exploration. Unlike traditional diet programmes, EASE does not aim to help people lose weight. The reasoning behind this shift is grounded in research showing that repeated dieting and a narrow focus on weight loss can itself reinforce shame and stigma, without improving long-term health outcomes.
Instead, over twelve sessions, participants are supported in building a more mindful and compassionate relationship with food, exercise and their own bodies. The programme combines techniques from intuitive eating with body-image work and embodiment exercises, alongside sessions specifically designed to help people unlearn negative beliefs they may have internalised about their own weight — a factor increasingly recognised in research as harmful in its own right, independent of a person’s actual weight.
The EASE pilot study is designed to explore how participants respond to this weight-neutral approach and whether it can be implemented in practice. It will include 40 participants, whose experiences will be compared with those of a group following “Ich nehm’ ab” (“I’m losing weight”), a standard weight-loss programme offered by the German Nutrition Society.
A European exchange of ideas
The EASE study also reflects the exchange of ideas Prof. Gisch has built across Europe in the context of EUPeace academic networking activities. Earlier this year, she gave a lecture and seminar on nutrition, eating disorders and obesity to students and doctoral researchers at Comillas Pontifical University in Madrid — an exchange that fed directly into her thinking on the EASE approach. Since May, Rémi Schneider, a doctoral researcher from the University of Limoges has been visiting JLU through a EUPeace Doctoral Mobility Grant. During his stay, he has been in academic exchange with Prof. Gisch’s team on topics related to the EASE study.
A step towards fairer healthcare
“Through EUPeace, we can exchange ideas across borders to work towards a more inclusive understanding of health,” says Prof. Gisch. By paying attention to people’s mental as well as physical well-being, and by working to reduce stigma, the EASE study aims to make a real difference to how obesity is understood and treated, both in Germany and more widely across Europe.
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