We all know that obesity or overweight happens to be no solution and at times it is found to proffer the greatest obstacle in due course. To be very precise, in the contemporary age this appears to be one of the most serious concerning factors gradually destroying the immune system and making the human body vulnerable to several diseases. But now is the time for the people highly concerned about the excessive weight gain to give a glance to the relationships in respect of their family and friends, to find out the definite source. This revelation has come from an investigative study that took place in the recent days. The study undertaken by the National Institute on Aging (NIA), the renowned constituent of the National Institutes of Health or NIH, brought to the fore the existence of the spreading of obesity within social networks and with the social connection becoming closer there happens to be the greater influence of the development of obesity, however apart they may live. It has also been averred in this respect that this meticulous study happens to be the first one in providing a comprehensive depiction of the role of the social networks in obesity and also its probable usefulness in the development of both clinical and public health interventions for obesity.

The study was conducted by the joint collaboration of Dr. Nicholas Christakis, M.D. of the Harvard Medical School and Dr. James Fowler of the University of California, San Diego through the effective utilization of the data from the Framingham Heart Study. The Framingham Heart Study is a repute institute and is supported by the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, another distinguished component of the NIH.

For the true exploration of whether there happens to be the spread of obesity within the realm of social networks the research team obtained the accurate data regarding the various aspects of weight, height and also others from the records of 5,124 Framingham Heart Study participants at up to seven time points between 1971 and 2003. Moreover, there had been the analysis of similar types of informations of the parents, spouses, siblings, children and close friends of these key partakers from the same Framingham records. It has been found that in concert these specific individuals formed a large, knotted social web totaling 12,067 people with the average age of the participants of 38 years, with a range of 21 to 70 years. One of the most noteworthy findings had been that, a key participant's chances of becoming obese increased by 57 percent if he or she had a close friend who became obese.

Speaking on Dr. Richard Suzman, Director of the NIA's Behavioral and Social Research Program said, "The rising rate of obesity threatens to reverse the decline in disability in the older population, with major implications for the health care system."   "This seminal study breaks important new ground in showing how social networks may amplify other factors and help account for the dramatic increase in obesity across the population," he concluded.