title: Public and health professionals' misconceptions about the dynamics of body weight gain/loss.
abstract: Human body energy storage operates as a stock-and-flow system with inflow (food intake) and outflow (energy expenditure). In spite of the ubiquity of stock-and-flow structures, evidence suggests that human beings fail to understand stock accumulation and rates of change, a difficulty called the stock-flow failure. This study examines the influence of health care training and cultural background in overcoming stock-flow failure. A standardized protocol assessed lay people's and health care professionals' ability to apply stock-and-flow reasoning to infer the dynamics of weight gain/loss during the holiday season (621 subjects from seven countries). Our results indicate that both types of subjects exhibited systematic errors indicative of use of erroneous heuristics. Stock-flow failure was found across cultures and was not improved by professional health training. The problem of stock-flow failure as a transcultural global issue with education and policy implications is discussed.
authors.affiliation: Department of Information Sciences, Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, CA 93943, U.S.A.
authors.forename: Tarek
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Abdel-Hamid
authors.affiliation: University of Minnesota Medical School Emergency Department, Saint Paul, United States.
authors.forename: Felix
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Ankel
authors.affiliation: Wright State Boonshoft School of Medicine, Center for Global Health, Kettering, United States.
authors.forename: Michele
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Battle-Fisher
authors.affiliation: University of Utah, VA Salt Lake City Healthcare System, Salt Lake City, United States.
authors.forename: Bryan
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Gibson
authors.affiliation: Universidad de los Andes, Departamento de Cálculo, Merida, Venezuela.
authors.forename: Gilberto
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Gonzalez-Parra
authors.affiliation: Virginia Tech, Management Systems Engineering, Falls Church, United States.
authors.forename: Mohammad
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Jalali
authors.affiliation: VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, VTT, ICT for Health, Tampere, Finland.
authors.forename: Kirsikka
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Kaipainen
authors.affiliation: University of Tennessee, UT Obesity Research Center and Department of Animal Science, Knoxville, Tennessee, United States.
authors.forename: Nishan
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Kalupahana
authors.affiliation: MIT, Sloan School, Cambridge, United States.
authors.forename: Ozge
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Karanfil
authors.affiliation: Virginia Bioinformatics Institute, Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Blacksburg, United States.
authors.forename: Achla
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Marathe
authors.affiliation: Health Partners Research Foundation, Minneapolis, United States.
authors.forename: Brian
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Martinson
authors.affiliation: Florida International University, Epidemiology, Miami, United States.
authors.forename: Karma
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: McKelvey
authors.affiliation: Indian Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, Centre for Health Informatics, New Delhi, India.
authors.forename: Suptendra Nath
authors.initials: SN
authors.lastname: Sarbadhikari
authors.affiliation: University of Vermont, Nutrition and Food Sciences, Burlington, United States.
authors.forename: Stephen
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Pintauro
authors.affiliation: Université Montpellier, Laboratoire de Pharmacologie et Physiopathologie Expérimentale, Montpellier, France.
authors.forename: Patrick
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Poucheret
authors.affiliation: Health Partners Research Foundation, Bloomington, United States.
authors.forename: Nicolaas
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Pronk
authors.affiliation: Shanghai University, Information Management, Shanghai, China.
authors.forename: Ying
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Qian
authors.affiliation: University of Alabama, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Tuscaloosa, United States.
authors.forename: Edward
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Sazonov
authors.affiliation: BI Norwegian Business School, Department of Leadership and Organizational, Behaviour, Nydalsveien 37 0442 Oslo, Norway.
authors.forename: Kim
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Van Oorschot
authors.affiliation: North Carolina State University, Health Systems Engineering Laboratory, Raleigh, United States.
authors.forename: Akshay
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Venkitasubramanian
authors.affiliation: Monterey Institute of International Studies, International Policy Studies, Monterey United States.
authors.forename: Philip
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Murphy