October 9, 2018

Weight Loss Report Analysis

Weight loss is difficult to achieve for overweight and obese people for all ages. The lab reports about weight loss are “Emotional Eating is Associated with Weight Loss Success Among Adults Enrolled in a Weight Loss Program” by A. Braden, S. W. Flatt, K. N. Boutelle, D. Strong, N. E. Sherwood, & C. L. Rock,“The Relationship Between Intuitive Eating and Postpartum Weight Loss” by K. Leahy, K. S. Berlin, G. G. Banks, & J. Bachman, and “Weight Control Behaviors of Highly Successful Weight Loss Maintainers: the Portuguese Weight Control Registry” by I. Santos,P. N. Vieira, M. N. Silva,  L. B. Sardinha, & P. J. Teixeira.While looking at all three lab reports, some sections were written better, some didn’t make any sense, and some didn’t have a section at all. Nevertheless, all three lab reports fulfill their function.

The abstracts in each lab report fulfilled its purpose to summarize the report. The main objective of Braden’s lab report was when a person decreases emotional stress eating, it can increase weight loss. There were no differences if a person needs an intervention or in usual care to lose weight due to emotional stress. This was a good abstract that fulfilled all its requirements. The requirements of a good abstract are to summarize the lab report in one paragraph: the purpose, experiment, and result. The whole report summary should be written in one paragraph for the abstract. The structural approach of Leahy’s lab report was different than when it came to the abstract. She summarized each section of her lab report by italicizing the heading and including a short summary of the experiment she conducted. This was an effective way for the reader to know the summary of each section of the lab report rather than reading the whole lab report. The aim of Santos’ report was to compare the different weight control behaviors the participant initiated to lose weight. The most important similarity was that all the reports had an overview, hypothesis, conclusion, and the study conducted in the abstract. The organization of Braden and Santos was similar that each summarized the lab report in one paragraph. For Leahy’s abstract she organized it in one paragraph as well, but she structured it by italicizing the heading.

The introduction in each lab report included background information but also has difference. The main difference between the introduction of each report was that in Leahy’s report, before the introduction she added a section called, “significance” to show readers why they undertook the study and why it was important for her to conduct it. In all three lab reports, they explained and added previous similar studies that were conducted and how theirs will be different. For the reader’s benefit, Leahy explained intuitive eating, which is an eating behavior that relies on internal hunger. She continues to explain why intuitive eating is an eating behavior rather than a diet program. Every lab report included background information. Braden’s lab report included background information on how many aspects triggers emotional eating and how overweight people are more focused on losing weight rather than focusing on fixing the emotional eating. For Santos’s report, Portugal databases were used rather than the US databases since it is “the only other nation with a comparable weight control registry”. It is more useful to use the Portugal databases since they are more complex and are more detailed than the US databases. Each lab report included previous experiments done to strengthen their experiment in comparison.

Every lab report had sub-sections under the Methods section. Braden included sub-sections such as study design, participants, measures, and statistical analyses. Leahy included sub-sections called research design and sample, instrumentation, and analysis of data. Santos’s report, as the two previous reports, also has sub-sections under the method section. The sub-sections were subjects, assessments, and statistical analysis. They included these sub-sections to make it easy for the reader to follow every step. In every lab report they included a criterion the participants had to follow to be in the study and when the study was conducted. For the Braden report, the participates were all asked three question with a true or false response. However, for Leahy’s experiment the participants were asked 21 questions and with a 1 (strongly disagree) to a 5 (strongly agree) response rather than a true and false as the Braden report. Ines also include how they acquired the participants and how they had to have a requirement to enter the study. They also answered a questionnaire to acquire the different types of behaviors they perform, to lose weight. For the study Leahy conducted, they measured a 1-5 scale as well. However, the representation of the 1-5 was different as the 1 represented as never and 5 represented as always.

For the result, there was data that wasn’t explained thoroughly for each lab report. Each lab report, included a table of its results. In Braden’s report, weight loss had a bigger increasement in the weight loss program than the usual care. However, there was a paragraph from the results that would be difficult to understand for the reader since we didn’t know what some words represented. There was just a mind-blowing amount of numbers and words I never seen before. For instance, in the result they started naming names called the “Wilks Lambda” and “partial eta squared”, which she didn’t even explain what it stood for or what it meant. When looking at the results for Leahy’s report, I wasn’t satisfied on how they structured it. She just explained the participants in how some weren’t helpful and how some completed an online or in-person survey. There was a sub-section of the Result called the BMI and Weight Change, which was more helpful to understand the results. They compared the weight before and postpartum and how much intuitive eating had an effect on weight loss. They came with the result that increase intuitive eating practices while having weight gain during pregnancy and had a higher postpartum weight decrease. This information was very helpful to determine the results for the experiment she conducted. In Santos’ report, the average participant lost about 18.3 kg. The results show that there was a gender difference since men chose to lose weight by physical activity and women chose to eat healthier and reduce portion size. Since all three lab reports were all about weight loss, all three lab reports concluded that there was an increase of weight loss while conducting the experiment.

Every report combined the discussion and conclusion in one section named “Discussion”. This organization was effective for the reader since the conclusion and discussion is the same concept in a psychology study. Rather than reading the discussion and conclusion into two separate paragraphs, all three authors combined it together for the benefit for the reader. Throughout each lab report’s discussion, the authors added the flaws and limitation of the study they conducted. Every report also revisited the aim and the result of the report. Leahy’s stated how intuitive eating was healthier and an alternate strategy for postpartum women, since they don’t have time to work out or enroll in a weight loss program. She continues to discuss about how intuitive may also help with mental health and lifestyle behavior and not only for postpartum women. It was helpful for the reader to understand the strengths but also their limitation and every report added that. Every report stated that they need more research at the end of the day and what are the steps they must take to improve it on the long run. However, for Santos’s report, she emphasized that is was one of the first studies to be done outside of North American for losing and maintaining weight loss. She concluded that high intake of protein and low intake of carbohydrates had increased their weight loss.

In conclusion, every lab report had its differences and similarities while comparing to each other. There were much more similarities since all three had a similar, weight loss. The differences were minimal but there was a clear difference when there was one. Overall, the lab reports were written in a structure that was easy to follow for the reader. They all were organized for a better understanding for the reader.

References

Braden, A., Flatt, S. W., Boutelle, K. N., Strong, D., Sherwood, N. E., & Rock, C. L. (2016). Emotional eating is associated with weight loss success among adults enrolled in a weight loss program. Journal of Behavioral Medicine,39(4), 727-732. doi:10.1007/s10865-016-9728-8

Leahy, K., Berlin, K. S., Banks, G. G., & Bachman, J. (2014). The Relationship between Intuitive Eating and Postpartum Weight Loss. Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics,114(9). doi: 10.1016/j.jand.2014.06.345

Santos, I., Vieira, P. N., Silva, M. N., Sardinha, L. B., & Teixeira, P. J. (2016). Weight control behaviors of highly successful weight loss maintainers: The Portuguese Weight Control Registry. Journal of Behavioral Medicine,40(2), 366-371. doi:10.1007/s10865-016-9786-y

 

October 16, 2018

Lab Report Self-Reflection

This assignment was to analyze three lab reports and to elaborate on the structure of the lab report. Thelab reports that I analyzed needed to be topics I was interested in to be able to do well for the analysis. I chose three different articles in the beginning, but then I realized it was much more work than necessary. Nevertheless, I concluded that working with three similar lab report was simpler, so I can work more efficiently.

The structure of the lab report analysis was different from when I initially wrote the draft compared to when I wrote my final. In my draft, I had a subtitle before every paragraph such as “Introduction” or “Methods”. However, while receiving constructed criticism, I realized it was not beneficial for the analysis to include subtitles. The entire structure changed throughout the process of writing this assignment.

I acknowledged the differences between both mine and others’ range of linguistic as a resource and drew on those resources to develop a rhetorical sensibility. Considering “rhetoric refers to the study and uses of written, spoken and visual language”, my language developed significantly from my draft to my final. Both students and the teacher who peer reviewed my draft gave me valuable criticism to help me improve my writing overall. Everyone edits their classmates work differently. Having multiple people peer reviewing your work will benefit your writing since everyone has different styles of writing.

I practiced using various library resources, online databases, and the internet to locate sources appropriate to my writing projects. I had to keep finding the most precise lab reports to analyze. The first three I used was student lab reports, which wasn’t the most effective reports. After that, I found NASA technical reports, however they were too complex and difficult to interpret. Finally, after all these struggles, a classmate suggested using the library resources. I finally found three lab reports that were in my interests in reading and elaborating. As a result of writing this assignment, it strengthened my sources and databases to provide evidence to my analysis. It helped me learned that school library resources are useful and helpful because they are also an alternative resource to find official lab reports or just any information in general.

The Course Learning Outcome that I took after writing this assignment was the most strengthening of my source use practices (including evaluating, integrating, quoting, paraphrasing, summarizing, synthesizing, analyzing, and citing sources). While receiving this assignment, lab report analysis, I knew that practices such as evaluating, integrating, quoting, paraphrasing, summarizing, synthesizing, analyzing, and citing sources would be all included. Since this assignment focused on analysis of three lab report, analyzing was a huge part of what I took from this assignment. While writing this assignment, I evaluated the three lab reports I was going to choose. I paraphrased and gave a short summary of each lab report. After completing everything, I cited my sources at the references page for APA style, which I learned something new. Since all my assignments are written in MLA style, I understood the format for APA style.