Imagine arriving home with a modest plan: change your shoes and take a walk before dinner. Your partner has been waiting to watch a program together. They express disappointment, and you reconsider. At a family meal later that week, you decline another serving. Someone keeps insisting after you explain your preference, then jokes that you have become difficult to feed. Both situations involve competing wishes, but they are not equivalent. Understanding what happened matters before deciding what to call it.

Changes in eating and physical activity take place within shared lives. A decision that seems private can alter how people spend time together, prepare meals, or express care. Research on social undermining examines interactions that may interfere with these behaviors (Scotti, Lavoie, et al., 2025). This perspective offers a way to recognize relational obstacles while keeping an important question open: what happened, and what did it mean in this particular relationship?

What Is Social Undermining

Social undermining in dietary and physical activity research refers to interactions or events that interfere with intended eating or exercise behaviors, whether intentionally or unintentionally. Examples include discouraging comments about exercise and pressure to eat foods someone is trying to avoid. Scotti and colleagues distinguish such interference from simply lacking encouragement or practical help (Scotti, Lavoie, et al., 2025).

The distinction requires care. A friend who declines a walking invitation may have limited time. A household member who cannot provide childcare may face a genuine constraint. Concern about an unsuitable plan also deserves consideration. Disappointment alone does not establish undermining, and pursuing a goal does not make every requested accommodation reasonable.

Eating and movement goals develop within everyday relationships. Much of the research concerns weight management, but changes in eating or activity are distinct from changes in weight (Scotti, Lavoie, et al., 2025). Here, the emphasis is on whether relationships allow people to pursue their chosen behaviors while respecting the needs of others.

Why Interference Does Not Necessarily Mean Sabotage

The word sabotage contains a claim about intention. Social undermining, as used in this literature, can encompass unintentional interactions as well. Scotti and colleagues found that none of the 33 studies in their scoping review directly examined intentionality, although one examined perceived motivations. Perceiving a motive and establishing it are different tasks (Scotti, Lavoie, et al., 2025).

A subsequent daily-life study offers a closer look. Participants perceived 75.7% of their 169 reported undermining experiences as unintentional. In interviews, they described others being unaware of their goals, unaware of the impact of their actions, or pursuing competing goals. These reports came from 36 young adult African American women; they describe perceived intent in this sample, not objectively verified motives or a population-wide rate (Scotti, Ross, et al., 2025).

How Relationships Can Complicate Healthy Change

Discouragement and Minimizing the Goal

Discouragement may be overt, such as teasing someone for exercising, or quieter, such as repeatedly treating a planned change as unnecessary. The review discusses comments that minimize a person’s behavioral choices and situations in which others encourage departure from a dietary or activity goal (Scotti, Lavoie, et al., 2025).

Repeated ridicule may make someone reluctant to exercise in front of others. An unexpected obligation may instead leave no time for the activity. These examples suggest different obstacles: discouragement can affect willingness, while practical demands can restrict opportunity. Theories of sustained behavior change consider both personal motivation and available resources (Kwasnicka et al., 2016). This offers a way to interpret the examples, rather than proof of how either interaction will affect a particular person.

Food Pressure and the Meaning of Sharing

Food can be part of hospitality and affection. The review describes pressure to overeat in social settings, including hospitality-related situations (Scotti, Lavoie, et al., 2025). An offer may be kindly intended while still making it harder for someone to follow a chosen eating pattern. The relevant question is how the interaction unfolds, including whether a refusal is accepted, rather than whether offering food is inherently harmful.

A person may want to enjoy a family gathering without having the contents of their plate become a public discussion. A host may misunderstand a changed preference as dissatisfaction with the meal. Those possibilities call for clarification. Accepting a declined serving can leave room for the meal’s social meaning without requiring everyone to eat in the same way.

Competing Routines and Exercise Plans

A new activity routine needs a place in an already occupied day. Meal preparation, caregiving, and shared leisure may all need adjustment. Kwasnicka and colleagues reviewed theories about how people sustain behavior change. These theories consider habits, available resources, and the social environment alongside motivation, helping explain why a practical difficulty cannot always be resolved by trying harder (Kwasnicka et al., 2016).

Habit research helps explain the importance of recurring opportunities. Lally and colleagues followed people repeating an eating, drinking, or activity behavior in the same setting and examined how it became more automatic. Missing one opportunity did not materially disrupt habit formation in their study (Lally et al., 2010). An occasional interruption need not be treated as a failure. The study did not examine relationship interference.

Social Support and Undermining in the Same Relationship

A relationship can contain both encouragement and interference. A partner may be pleased about a walking routine but object when it changes the evening meal. A relative may offer practical help while making dismissive comments. The review describes support and undermining occurring together, including within close relationships. Supportive behavior should not be assumed to cancel out undermining automatically (Scotti, Lavoie, et al., 2025).

This connects with Social Support Theory, which considers the emotional and practical resources relationships can provide. Responsive support asks how those resources fit the person and situation. Someone who feels loved may still need a different kind of help with a particular goal. Acknowledging that mismatch can make a conversation more specific than deciding whether the entire relationship is supportive (Feeney & Collins, 2015).

Ogden and Quirke-McFarlane propose a model that distinguishes deliberate sabotage, feeding someone beyond their wishes, and collusion. In this model, collusion means going along with behavior that conflicts with a person’s goal in order to avoid disagreement. The authors suggest that these interactions can help preserve familiar relationship routines when one person is trying to change. Their model offers possible explanations, not a way to establish another person’s motives (Ogden & Quirke-McFarlane, 2023).

When Help Becomes Unwanted Pressure

Support depends partly on how well a person understands what is needed. Feeney and Collins describe effective support as requiring the ability, resources, and willingness to respond with care. Their framework recognizes both the recipient’s independence and the supporter’s own limits and responsibilities (Feeney & Collins, 2015).

A study of 201 adults helps explain why the kind of support matters. People who reported more autonomy support—help that respects their choices—six months into a weight-loss program tended to have lost more weight by 18 months. More encouragement from a partner to eat healthily at six months was linked with less weight loss at 18 months. But researchers did not assign people to receive different kinds of support. Partners may have offered more encouragement because someone was already struggling. The study therefore cannot show that encouragement caused poorer progress (Gorin et al., 2014).

Research Findings and Their Limits

Scotti and colleagues brought together 33 studies involving adults, both within and outside weight-loss programs. Researchers did not always define undermining in the same way. Many questionnaires also had limited evidence that they measured it consistently or captured the intended concept. As a result, studies using similar labels may describe somewhat different experiences (Scotti, Lavoie, et al., 2025).

Only five studies in the review examined how undermining was linked with what people actually ate or how physically active they were. Most measured these experiences and behaviors at a single point in time, making it difficult to tell which came first. Few studies followed weight changes over time, and their findings did not agree. The research gives us reason to pay attention to undermining, but it does not yet establish how much it changes behavior or weight, or whether it causes those changes (Scotti, Lavoie, et al., 2025).

The newer daily-life study used smartphone surveys over two weeks, followed by interviews. Eating-related events accounted for 79.3% of reported undermining experiences; reports came from friends, partners, relatives, and others. Its close attention to everyday encounters adds detail, but this paper characterized experiences rather than testing whether they caused dietary or exercise lapses (Scotti, Ross, et al., 2025).

These findings cannot explain every family or cultural setting. They also concern eating, physical activity, and weight management; applying them to study or workplace goals would require additional evidence.

Recognizing the Pattern Without Guessing the Motive

A useful starting point is to separate the event from the explanation. “She offered dessert again after I declined” describes an interaction. “She wants me to fail” assigns a motive. The second statement may feel convincing, but it requires evidence beyond the first. Daily-life research illustrates why this distinction matters: participants described different reasons for perceiving interference as intentional or unintentional (Scotti, Ross, et al., 2025).

Consider how the same meal might unfold. A host offers more food, hears a refusal, and accepts it. Another continues pressing after the guest explains their preference. In a third situation, two household members disagree about what they can afford or have time to prepare. The first respects a choice; the second may restrict room to exercise it; the third requires practical negotiation. Calling all three sabotage would erase useful differences.

Understanding a pattern requires attention to what was said or done, whether the goal was known, and how the other person responded when the impact was explained. Repeated pressure after clarification may call for a different response from a misunderstanding that is readily resolved. These distinctions guide reflection; they do not establish intent. The focus remains on the interaction and its effects, rather than a judgment about the entire relationship.

Making Room for Change Within Relationships

Communication and planning are reasonable places to start, but their benefits should not be overstated. In a study of 64 couples, both groups attended a weight-loss program; one group also received training in supporting a partner’s choices. Researchers found no clear overall advantage from the extra training, either in weight loss or in how much this kind of support improved. Across both groups, greater support for personal choice was linked with greater weight loss. That connection does not show that the extra training produced the improvement (Gorin et al., 2020).

Describe the Interaction and Ask for Specific Help

A concrete description gives the other person something they can respond to: “When errands are added during my planned walk, I miss it. Could we choose a different time for them?” This expresses a need without claiming to know a motive. It also allows the other person to explain a competing need. Such a conversation is consistent with responsive support, which depends on understanding the person and the situation (Feeney & Collins, 2015).

The person offering support also has a role. Asking what help is wanted, accepting a declined offer, and revisiting shared arrangements can respect the other person’s choices. A requested reminder may be welcome where unsolicited monitoring is not. These suggestions apply the broader principles of responsive support; their value depends on the people and circumstances involved (Feeney & Collins, 2015; Gorin et al., 2014).

Renegotiate Shared Routines

Some changes require a shared arrangement. A household might agree on activity time or prepare a meal that allows different preferences without separate dinners. Such arrangements depend on available time and responsibilities. Habit and maintenance research support attention to these recurring conditions, alongside individual motivation (Kwasnicka et al., 2016; Lally et al., 2010).

Planning for Recurring Obstacles

Implementation intentions link a foreseeable situation with a chosen response: “If dinner runs late, I will use my shorter walking route.” Gollwitzer and Sheeran’s meta-analysis found that this kind of if–then planning supported goal attainment across varied settings. The broader evidence makes planning worth considering, while leaving open how well it addresses specific undermining experiences (Gollwitzer & Sheeran, 2006).

A fallback plan can preserve an opportunity, but it cannot create childcare, resolve every disagreement, or make another person cooperate. Sometimes the needed change is additional practical support. Sometimes a plan itself needs revision. Responsibility for finding a response should not be confused with blame for the obstacle.

A Few Words by Psychology Fanatic

The walk in the opening scene need not mean giving up time together. The program might wait, or the evening may require a different arrangement. At the family table, accepting a declined serving can let attention return to the conversation. Neither moment requires complete agreement about how another person should eat or spend their time.

There is room to care about someone without directing each of their choices. There is also room to acknowledge that a familiar routine has become difficult to share. Naming the difficulty carefully can help a relationship adjust while leaving each person a voice in what happens next.

Associated Concepts

• Social Support Theory: Explains how relationships offer emotional, informational, and practical resources. The fit between help and need connects directly with this article’s discussion.
• Habit Formation: Examines how repetition in recurring contexts contributes to more automatic behavior, providing context for the importance of everyday routines.
• Model of Action Phases: Distinguishes choosing a goal from planning and carrying it out. Its discussion of implementation intentions connects with preparing for predictable obstacles.
• Self-Determination Theory: This theory emphasizes autonomy, competence, and relatedness in motivation. It helps explain why support that respects personal choice may be more helpful than pressure to change.
• Attribution Theory: How we explain another person’s behavior shapes our response. This perspective helps distinguish the effects of an undermining interaction from assumptions about the person’s intentions.
• Relationship Communication: Expressing needs, listening, and discussing shared expectations can help people navigate competing routines. These conversations create opportunities to clarify what support would look like during dietary and physical activity changes.

References

Feeney, Brooke C.; Collins, Nancy L. (2015). A New Look at Social Support: A Theoretical Perspective on Thriving Through Relationships. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 19(2), 113–147. DOI: 10.1177/1088868314544222.
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Gollwitzer, Peter M.; Sheeran, Paschal (2006). Implementation Intentions and Goal Achievement: A Meta-Analysis of Effects and Processes. In Mark P. Zanna (Ed.), Advances in Experimental Social Psychology (Vol. 38, pp. 69–119). Elsevier. DOI: 10.1016/S0065-2601(06)38002-1.
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Gorin, Amy A.; Powers, Theodore A.; Gettens, Katelyn; Cornelius, Talea; Koestner, Richard; Mobley, Amy R.; Pescatello, Linda S.; Huedo-Medina, Tania B. (2020). A Randomized Controlled Trial of a Theory-Based Weight Loss Program for Couples. Health Psychology, 39(2), 137–146. DOI: 10.1037/hea0000808.
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Gorin, Amy A.; Powers, Theodore A.; Koestner, Richard; Wing, Rena R.; Raynor, Hollie A. (2014). Autonomy Support, Self-Regulation, and Weight Loss. Health Psychology, 33(4), 332–339. DOI: 10.1037/a0032586.
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Kwasnicka, Dominika; Dombrowski, Stephan U.; White, Martin; Sniehotta, Falko (2016). Theoretical Explanations for Maintenance of Behaviour Change: A Systematic Review of Behaviour Theories. Health Psychology Review, 10(3), 277–296. DOI: 10.1080/17437199.2016.1151372.
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Lally, Phillippa; van Jaarsveld, Cornelia H. M.; Potts, Henry W. W.; Wardle, Jane (2010). How Are Habits Formed: Modelling Habit Formation in the Real World. European Journal of Social Psychology, 40(6), 998–1009. DOI: 10.1002/ejsp.674.
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Ogden, Jane; Quirke-McFarlane, Sophia (2023). Sabotage, Collusion, and Being a Feeder: Towards a New Model of Negative Social Support and Its Impact on Weight Management. Current Obesity Reports, 12(2), 183–190. DOI: 10.1007/s13679-023-00504-5.
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Scotti, Kellie B.; Lavoie, Hannah A.; Bryson, Hannah; McVay, Megan A. (2025). Understanding the Social Undermining of Dietary and Physical Activity Behaviors: A Systematic Scoping Review. Health Psychology, 44(7), 665–676. DOI: 10.1037/hea0001456.
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Scotti, Kellie B.; Ross, Kathryn M.; Baskin, Monica L.; Jake-Schoffman, Danielle E.; Deceus, Dieulerne; O’Neal, LaToya J.; McVay, Megan A. (2025). Social Undermining of Weight Management Behaviors Among Young Adult African American Women: An Ecological Momentary Assessment and Mixed-Method Study. Annals of Behavioral Medicine, 59(1), kaaf056. DOI: 10.1093/abm/kaaf056.
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