Pilot Trial of the Move Healthier Group

The researchers are developing a new exercise-focused group and are interested in studying whether this group helps people increase their exercise without increasing risk for disordered eating behaviors.

Study Overview

• Status: Enrolling by invitation
• Conditions: Obesity; Overweight
• Intervention / Treatment: Behavioral: Move Healthier Intervention

Detailed Description

Individuals seeking weight loss are often encouraged to increase their exercise engagement as a health-promoting behavior. However, exercise engagement is often connected directly to caloric intake within weight loss interventions, so it is likely that individuals seeking weight loss are engaging in some level of compensatory exercise even in the absence of other disordered eating symptoms. Compensatory exercise is defined as exercising to "offset" or "make up for" calories consumed with the intent of controlling one's body weight or shape. The researchers are developing a new group to promote healthy exercise and are interested in studying whether this group helps people increase their exercise without increasing risk for compensatory exercise or other disordered eating behaviors.

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Estimated): 12
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• United States
  • New Hampshire
    • Lebanon, New Hampshire, United States, 03766
      • Dartmouth-Hitchcock Clinics

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: Adult; Older Adult
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• Seen for weight loss treatment at DHMC Weight Center within the past year
• Speak, read, & write English fluently
• Age 18 or older
• Appropriate for group visits (as assessed by referring provider)

Exclusion Criteria:

• Meets DSM-5 criteria for an eating disorder based on behavior frequencies reported on baseline EDE-Q
• Report contraindications for unsupervised physical activity on the PAR-Q, or have not been medically cleared by an MD for participation.

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Treatment
• Allocation: N/A
• Interventional Model: Single Group Assignment
• Masking: None (Open Label)

Number of Arms

1

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: Move Healthier Group Intervention Arm; This group-based intervention aims to promote healthy exercise without increasing risk for compensatory exercise or other disordered eating behaviors. Participants will attend 12 weekly 90-minute group intervention sessions via telehealth software.	Behavioral: Move Healthier Intervention; The intervention aims to increase exercise using cognitive and behavioral skills integrated across several treatment manuals including the Physical Activity Cognitively Enhanced (PACE) intervention for healthy exercise promotion in eating disorders, acceptance-based and standard behavioral weight loss manuals, and affect-guided exercise prescriptions.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Objective physical activity	Objective physical activity will be measures as the total number of minutes per week of physical activity measured via Fitbit device worn during waking hours. The Fitbit data will yield a total count of the number of minutes of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity for each week during the intervention period, with higher counts indicating greater levels of activity.	From enrollment to the end of treatment at 12 weeks
Self-reported physical activity	Participants will also complete self-report measures of physical activity, including the International Physical Activity Questionnaire (IPAQ) and IPAQ-short form at group sessions and study assessments. The IPAQ asks patients to report on their total physical activity engagement over the past 7 days by light, moderate, and vigorous activity categories. The IPAQ yields a total count of the number of minutes of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity over the past week, with higher minutes indicating more activity.	From enrollment to the end of treatment at 12 weeks
Eating disorder symptoms	ED symptoms will be assessed via the Eating Disorder Examination Questionnaire (EDE-Q 6.0), which asks about ED symptoms over the past month (28 days). Compensatory exercise engagement will be assessed via an item asking, "Over the past 28 days, how many times have you exercised to "make up for" a binge-eating episode, and compulsive exercise will be assessed using the item "...how many times have you felt driven/compelled to exercise?" EDE-Q items are averages to calculate a total score ranging from 0-6, with higher scores indicating higher levels of eating pathology.	Baseline and post-intervention (week 12)

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Weight bias internalization	Internalized weight stigma will be measured using the Weight Bias Internalization Scale (WBIS). The WBIS comprises 11 items measuring self-directed weight bias and has shown excellent convergent and divergent validity within the population of interest. The WBIS items are averaged to yield a total score ranging from 1-7, with higher scores reflecting higher internalized weight bias.	baseline and post-intervention (week 12)
intervention acceptability	Participants will complete qualitative interviews at post-treatment to provide feedback on group format, acceptability, utility, etc. Qualitative analysis of these interview transcripts will elucidate themes related to group acceptability.	post-intervention (week 12)
intervention feasibility	Feasibility will be measured via group attendance rates across the 12 sessions.	post-intervention (week 12)

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center
• Investigators: Study Director: Jessica Salwen-Deremer, PhD, Dartmouth Health; Principal Investigator: Elizabeth Lampe, PhD, Dartmouth Health

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Actual): April 16, 2026
• Primary Completion (Estimated): August 30, 2026
• Study Completion (Estimated): August 30, 2026

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: January 13, 2026
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: February 5, 2026
• First Posted (Actual): February 12, 2026

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): April 28, 2026
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: April 23, 2026
• Last Verified: April 1, 2026

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Keywords: physical activity; exercise; eating disorder; disordered eating
• Additional Relevant MeSH Terms: Mental Disorders; Nutrition Disorders; Overnutrition; Body Weight; Signs and Symptoms, Digestive; Pathological Conditions, Signs and Symptoms; Behavior; Nutritional and Metabolic Diseases; Signs and Symptoms; Overweight; Obesity; Feeding and Eating Disorders; Motor Activity
• Other Study ID Numbers: STUDY02003218

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: NO
• IPD Plan Description: IPD may be shared to facilitate future research study recruitment and/or to answer future research questions. There is no plan to share IPD at this time.

Drug and device information, study documents

• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product: No
• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product: No