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African American women may need to work harder to lose weight.

New research reveals that African American women need to eat fewer calories or burn more than their white counterparts to lose a comparable amount of weight.

Previous studies found that African-American women don't lose as much weight as white women in response to the same behavioral interventions of calorie restriction or increased physical activity.

"At first, it was thought that perhaps the African-American women didn't adhere as closely to their calorie prescriptions or that the interventions were not culturally sensitive," lead researcher James P. DeLany, Ph.D., associate professor, Division of Endocrinology and Metabolism, Pitt School of Medicine said in a news release. "But even in research projects that were designed to address those possibilities, the difference in weight loss remained."

Researchers examined the body weight changes, energy expenditure, physical activity and energy intake among 39 severely obese African American and 66 white women who took part in a six-month weight loss program of calorie restriction and increased physical activity.

Researchers found that African-American women lost about seven pounds fewer than the Caucasian women, even though they started at the same body mass index and adhered to the diet and exercise regimes of the program.

Researchers explained that African American women had lower resting metabolic rates and used less energy daily that the other group.

"We prescribe how many calories are allowed and how much activity is needed during weight loss interventions based on the premise that people of the same weight have similar metabolic rates," DeLany explained. "But to account for their lower metabolic rate, African-American women must further reduce the number of calories they eat or use up more of them with exercise in order to lose the same number of pounds in the same time span as a Caucasian woman of the same weight."

The findings are published in the International Journal of Obesity.