Personality, weight loss and obesity related well-being post bariatric surgery

Purpose: The aim of the study was to examine the associations between personality, weight loss and obesity-related well-being post-bariatric surgery. It was hypothesized that persons who had undergone bariatric surgery who exhibit Extraversion, Conscientiousness, Agreeableness and Intellect/Imagination will have greater obesity related well-being, whereas those low on Emotional stability will have poorer obesity well-being. Method: The cross-sectional sample comprised 127 females who had received bariatric surgery. The average age of participants was 45 years. Quality of life was measured using the Obesity Related Well-Being scale (ORWELL 97). Personality was assessed with the International Personality Item Pool (IPIP) 50-item measure of the Five-Factor Model. Results: The mean BMI for the sample was 34.13 (SD=7.8). Females with a larger BMI who had undergone bariatric surgery had lower obesity-related well-being. Conscientiousness was negatively associated with BMI. Separate Hierarchical regression analyses found that Emotional stability (Beta=-.43, -.47, -.36) and Agreeableness (Beta=.27, .29, .25) predicted overall well-being, symptom occurrence and subjective relevance of distress respectively. BMI predicted occurrence of symptoms (Beta=.23). Conclusions: The findings have implications for the development of personality-informed interventions for bariatric patients in enhancing well-being and weight-loss maintenance following surgery