Americans see fat as normal as weights rise: study

[Cannae]

I don't feel like paying for people who don't take responsibility for their own health seriously...

Simple. Under my version of nationalised helath care tax payers would not have to pay for things like smoking, obestity and in some cases drinking. The people who do these things should pay themselves and do not deserve care untill they have kicked the bucket for an extended period of time.

 

[El_Machinae]

Another reason to oppose Socialized Medicine. I don't feel like paying for people who don't take responsibility for their own health seriously...

I dunno. I don't think there's a correlation between whether people pay their own medical bills and their health. People getting public insurance or paying their own insurance seem to have the same latent levels of healthy-lifestyles. I could be wrong, it's just the 'vibe' I'm working with

 

[Bamspeedy]

Fatness being socially contagious was also revealed a month or so ago by a different study:

http://www.livescience.com/health/070725_fat_friends.html

Study: Obesity is Socially Contagious
By Jeanna Bryner, LiveScience Staff Writer

posted: 25 July 2007 02:31 pm ET

People who notice a friend packing on pounds might want to steer clear if they value a sleek physique.

A new study finds that when the scale reads "obese" for one individual, the odds that their friends will become obese increase by more than 50 percent.

The study, published in the July 26 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, suggests that obesity is "socially contagious," as it can spread among individuals in close social circles. The likely explanation: A person's idea of what is an appropriate body size is affected by the size of his or her friends.

Conversely, the researchers found that thinness is also contagious.

"Social effects, I think, are much stronger than people before realized," said co-author James Fowler, a social-networks expert at the University of California-San Diego. "There's been an intensive effort to find genes that are responsible for obesity and physical processes that are responsible for obesity, and what our paper suggests is that you really should spend time looking at the social side of life as well."

An outside expert on social networks called the new research impressive, particularly in showing a causal link between obesity and friends. However, he cautioned that the evidence for the effect extending out to friends' friends, and so on, is weaker.

"The suggestion in their paper is that obesity sort of spreads through the network as if it were some kind of epidemic, some kind of contagious disease," said Duncan Watts, who studies social networks at Columbia University. While this is plausible, he noted, the current research doesn't provide direct evidence for this phenomena.

Social networks

Research has shown that peers influence each other's health behaviors. One past study showed that teens associating with friends who smoke and drink were more likely to take up the behaviors. However, no past research has looked at how the impact extends to friends' friends and beyond.

In the new study, Fowler and Nicholas Christakis of Harvard Medical School analyzed health data collected between 1971 and 2003 from more than 12,000 adults who participated in the Framingham Heart Study, an ongoing cardiovascular study. Participants provided contact information for close friends, many of whom were also study participants, resulting in a total of 38,611 social and family ties.

The researchers found that if a participant's friend became obese over the course of the study, the chances that the participant also became obese increased by 57 percent. Among mutual friends (both individuals indicate the other is a "friend"), the chances nearly tripled.

Among siblings, if one becomes obese the likelihood of their sister or brother becoming obese increases by 40 percent. Among spouses there is a 37 percent increased risk.

Gender also affected the degree of "obesity contagion." In same-sex friendships, individuals had a 71 percent increased risk of obesity if a friend became obese. If a guy's brother is obese, he's 44 percent more likely to also become obese. Among sisters, the risk was 67 percent.

Fat factors

Other studies have suggested that obesity might be physically contagious, possibly passing from one person to another by virus. But that idea has not been firmly supported. The new study doesn't address this possibility but instead looked at mindsets and attitudes as the controlling factors.

Fat-fueling factors were taken into consideration. For instance, the researchers made sure the effect wasn't a case of "birds of a feather flocking together." Body measurements were taken throughout the study period, showing when individuals became obese and whether they began the study with obese readings.

"It's not that obese or non-obese people simply find other similar people to hang out with," Christakis said. "Rather, there is a direct, causal relationship."

They also ruled out the idea that an outside factor, and not the friendship, caused the fatness. If an environmental factor were affecting both individuals in a friendship, then it shouldn't matter whether individuals are mutual friends or just one individual labels the other as a friend.

The study, however, found that it does matter which way the friend arrow points: If subjects named an obese person as a friend, they tended to be affected by that person's obesity.

But when the person on the receiving end did not label the first person as a friend, there was no "obesity contagion" effect in the other direction. The distinct variable here is who calls whom a "friend."

"The fact that it only has an effect when I think you're my friend is very strongly suggestive to me," Watts said. "That's about as good as you can do in terms of identifying a causal relationship."

Perhaps friends just spend a lot of time together and so would eat similar foods and engage in the same physical activities. But they found the results held no matter the geographic proximity of friends.

"So friends that are thousands of miles away have just as large an impact on you as friends who are right next door," Fowler told LiveScience.

The scientists suggest the findings can be explained if friends are influencing one another's norms for body weight.

"What appears to be happening is that a person becoming obese most likely causes a change of norms about what counts as an appropriate body size," Christakis said. "People come to think that it is OK to be bigger since those around them are bigger, and this sensibility spreads."

Bulging waistlines

In the past 25 years, obesity among U.S. adults has shot from 15 to 32 percent. The new study reveals friends could be feeding the fat epidemic, along with our large-serving, high-calorie, fast-food lifestyles.

"We show that one person's behavior ripples through the network to have an impact beyond those first-order friendships," Fowler said. "So we're talking about dozens of people that are affected by one person's health outcomes and health behaviors."

He added, "And that needs to be taken into account by policy analysts and also by politicians who are trying to decide what the best measures are for making society healthier."

 

[Bamspeedy]

I dunno. I don't think there's a correlation between whether people pay their own medical bills and their health. People getting public insurance or paying their own insurance seem to have the same latent levels of healthy-lifestyles. I could be wrong, it's just the 'vibe' I'm working with

I've been trying to say that for so long. Socialized medicine isn't going to get Americans to eat heathier and get off the couch or get us to walk more instead of driving places, so Americans will still be less healthy than Europeans. Changing our lifestyle will have a much bigger impact on our health than making a huge overhaul of our health care system.

 

[El_Machinae]

Clearly better health choices would benefit the health budgets. Even better, so many other fields and areas of the economy would improve too. Heck, losing 100lbs will save $40 in gas every year.

 

[LordRahl]

I dunno. I don't think there's a correlation between whether people pay their own medical bills and their health. People getting public insurance or paying their own insurance seem to have the same latent levels of healthy-lifestyles. I could be wrong, it's just the 'vibe' I'm working with

Wrong. If you're paying for it - you start caring about it. If it's "free" - you have that much less incentive to care. Think driving company car, vs. your own car.

 

[El_Machinae]

Wrong. If you're paying for it - you start caring about it. If it's "free" - you have that much less incentive to care. Think driving company car, vs. your own car.

I understand the theory, but I don't think that people really judge their long-term health according to those criteria (or at least, they don't weigh those criteria strongly enough to matter). What I mean is that people aren't factoring in the dollar costs they'll suffer in 30 years when they sit at the couch watching TV and eating Doritos, and so they're not too worried if they're paying the insurance or on the public dime.

I'm suggesting that if people are paying their own insurance, or if someone else is paying their insurance, I wouldn't expect a significant different in health factors. I know it makes sense that people would care if they're paying, but I don't think they do. People don't worry about their health (it seems) because of the cost of future medical bills: they worry about health for its own sake.

 

[wicshade]

as i thought more and more about OP, America actualy looks down at overwhieght people more then it used to, it used to be desiarable for a women to be thick in all places, it was even a symbol of wealth

today being overwheight is actualy looked at completely opposite,
1, People think fat people are poor/lazy/undisaplined/unhealthy and only eat the McDonalds dollar menu
2, Men seem to won't a thin woman over a thick one.

and today women stress a great deal about keeping thin and such, so it seems to me that people actualy repel oeverwhietness, though it is more comon in some places for people to be fat.

I realy don't see how anybody can see how society is accepting fatness, it is actualy more discriminated against now then it ever has been befor.

 

[Narz]

 

[Snowball]

I've found its not due to poor eating habits, but rather lack of exercise that is the main contributing factor. I'm 5-10, 125 lbs., and eat usually twice the amount people my same age eat. The difference is, I run 7-10 miles a day.

 

[Godwynn]

Another reason to oppose Socialized Medicine. I don't feel like paying for people who don't take responsibility for their own health seriously...

I agree with the above statement.

 

[Narz]

I've found its not due to poor eating habits, but rather lack of exercise that is the main contributing factor. I'm 5-10, 125 lbs., and eat usually twice the amount people my same age eat. The difference is, I run 7-10 miles a day.

The difference is, you're probably also a teenager.

 

[West 36]

So, does this mean the terrorists are winning?

 

[drachasor]

Another reason to oppose Socialized Medicine. I don't feel like paying for people who don't take responsibility for their own health seriously...

I strongly disagree. In fact, this is another reason to support Socialized Medicine. In such a system the PEOPLE are directly responsible and directly pay the costs of health care. That means we are going to have a lot more incentive for preventative health measures (such as better food standards, more research into making healthier food and medicines to help with this).

In a private system, with the profits in the hands of private corporations, they have very little incentive to pursue this, and in fact have a lot of incentives to discourage health improvements. Society still has to pay the costs (in a more individual manner), but now the costs stay high since the incentives to lower them aren't in effective places. That drags society down, and the expenditure of energy could be better spent elsewhere.

In any case, widespread health problems are ALWAYS a good reason to support a more socialized healthcare system, economically speaking.

-Drachasor

 

[Narz]

Interesting Drachasor. Never heard it put quite that way before but it makes sense.

 

[Leonel]

Well if we didn't have this "being overweight is a life choice and thus should be accepted along with all other life choices" garbage, this wouldn't be the case!

 

[TheBoatman]

As snowball said, exercise is the key. Walking is a nice start for people who didn't do any sport before and any faster activity would destroy their joints. If you are only a bit overweight you can start any sport you want.

Just a note: the article states arithmetic mean of weight, but that mathematicaly means that >50% of people are lighter than the figure stated.

Ad health care: I agree with obligatory insurance covering basic medical treatment and voluntary insurace covering above standard care. Boni and mali for lifestyle and prevention are a nice idea as well.