Poll about main causes of obesity

[Quackers]

We learned how to make a few things at school. It wasn't very useful.
I learned far more at home.

Still, i've heard people saying we should teach children the following:

-how to cook nutritious meals,
-how to plan finance,
-how to wear a condom (gen. sex ed),
-how to fill out and return a tax form,
-how to be an entrepreneur,
-how to be resilient and attentive (from a Britsh politician today),
-avoiding online bullying,

Children have to learn maths, english and science at some point too
You may have to add a few hours each day to make a perfect little citizen.

 

[Zack]

-how to wear a condom

Hell, they'd have to add on a few hours each day for this alone. Maybe even an additional year of schooling.

 

[Dralix]

My vote is for consuming more calories than you burn.

 

[BenitoChavez]

My vote is for psychology. It is a driving force behind most people's lifestyles and the combination of lifestyle/psychology affect the prevalence of unhealthy foods. Genetics is its own thing and can be overcome by lifestyle changes.

As I see it, most people prefer short term rewards vs long term awards. That salty, sugary, high calorie food is more immediately desirable than avoiding health problems a couple of years/decades down the line. Getting an expensive fast food meal in 10 minutes is more immediately desirable than making a large amount of food for several meals at home, for less money per meal, but it taking over an hour to make.

It doesn't make logical sense, but then again, humans aren't always logical

Because unhealthy food is more desirable in the short term, that means people are more likely to buy it. Because people are more likely to buy it, companies are more likely to produce more unhealthy food.

 

[warpus]

A lot of people are also addicted to those salty, sweet, highly processed foods. I suppose that's psychological to some extent.

 

[Perfection]

CIA put drugs in the water that make us tubby

 

[Kyriakos]

It does seem very true that obesity was never before around in the current percentages.

It always strikes me as the "body as a prison" ending. After some weight one has to assume that the person just keeps on eating so much out of pure despair. Losing weight can be very very difficult even if one is just "fat", more so if he has little willpower, and the first stages of weight-losing are by far the most difficult ones anyway...

 

[Angst]

Lifestyle/foodstuffs.

 

[Borachio]

Lifestyle/foodstuffs, certainly has it covered.

But it seems likely too that the human metabolism has been adapted for periods of famine followed by glut: that the ability to store energy for long periods isn't a design fault at all.

The human body is not well-adapted to a regime of three meals a day, interspersed with snacking, and a diet high in sugar and salt.

And of course, coupled with low activity.

 

[Arwon]

Depends on the person, life isn't monocausal.

It's a bit of pychological addiction, a bit physical addiction to certain processed foods, a bit of lifestyle, and also a heavy correlation with poverty in the developed world.

 

[DemonicAppleGuY]

I think it is correlated quite closely to the increase in the availability of food in the modern world.

Even though some countries are heavier than others, it is on the rise everywhere.

 

[Disgustipated]

Have to go with lifestyle.

I've been thinking of this, and when I was a kid, most kids were thin, and not fat. Same with adults. Something happened in the last 30 years. And it isn't food, we had the same unhealthy foods in the 80's. Soda was just as abundant in the 80's. So I can't blame it all on the foods. The problem is with us.

I think it is correlated quite closely to the increase in the availability of food in the modern world.

I disagree. We had McDonald's and soda back in the 70's and 80's, and people weren't fat back then. Our culture has changed (and why I voted lifestyle).

 

[Zelig]

I've been thinking of this, and when I was a kid, most kids were thin, and not fat. Same with adults. Something happened in the last 30 years. And it isn't food, we had the same unhealthy foods in the 80's. Soda was just as abundant in the 80's. So I can't blame it all on the foods.

Sugar consumption has increased by about a pound of pure sugar every two weeks since the 80's:

 

[Disgustipated]

Sugar consumption has increased by about a pound of pure sugar every two weeks since the 80's:

No argument here. My point it's not because of availability (although I'll admit many companies are sneaking sugar into products it doesn't belong like bread). All this sugar was available to us in the 70's and the 80's. Our lifestyle is why we didn't eat too much of it. It wasn't culturally acceptable to be fat.

 

[luiz]

No argument here. My point it's not because of availability (although I'll admit many companies are sneaking sugar into products it doesn't belong like bread). All this sugar was available to us in the 70's and the 80's. Our lifestyle is why we didn't eat too much of it. It wasn't culturally acceptable to be fat.

And kids probably spent far more time outside doing physical activities as there were not nearly as much indoor entertainment options.

I was a kid in the 1980's, and my notion of fun was playing ball in the park. There was nothing to do at our apartment, I hated staying indoors. TV sucked (programming only started at 6 or 7 am, before that the screen would show color stripes!). And there were exactly 3 channels to choose from, all bad.

Of course, Brazil in the 80's was probably close to the developed world in 60's or even 50's. People in the rich world probably already had videogames and good TV; I only got those in the mid 1990's.

 

[Disgustipated]

And kids probably spent far more time outside doing physical activities as there were not nearly as much indoor entertainment options.

I was a kid in the 1980's, and my notion of fun was playing ball in the park. There was nothing to do at our apartment, I hated staying indoors. TV sucked (programming only started at 6 or 7 am, before that the screen would show color stripes!). And there were exactly 3 channels to choose from, all bad.

Of course, Brazil in the 80's was probably close to the developed world in 60's or even 50's. People in the rich world probably already had videogames and good TV; I only got those in the mid 1990's.

It wasn't much better where I lived. 4 tv channels. They seemed either geared for adults or little kids (I never cared for cartoons after a young age). There were some good video games, but I easily got bored of them. You were lucky to get 10 hours of play out of a game back then. Wasteland is the best I remember. But that was difficult, and I never finished. All video games back then were insanely difficult.

Riding a bicycle in the desert was still some of the best entertainment around. So I suppose I should amend my above statement about lifestyle, and add technology to the list.

 

[Kyriakos]

I spent hours playing outside too, with the other kids in the part of the city i was in. Then i got an Amstrad when i was 8 (near the end of the 80s), and virtually never played hide and seek or other such games outside again...

It was a bit sad, but on the other hand the computer games had their own charm. Material toys are more important though, to young children, and the traditional games outdoors often were great too (despite the fact that i was already introverted).

 

[warpus]

Maybe sugary crap is just much easier to access these days, while access to healthier foods has decreased in quality/financial availability? But I really have no idea.

My guess is some of it has to do with people being genuinely addicted to sugar and other addictive foods. Why are more people addicted? Maybe the companies who make this stuff have figured out even better ways to addict us to their crap?

 

[Kyriakos]

While i like sugar (and chocolate), the only obviously addictive product with either would be coke and similar soda drinks.

 

[Akka]

I think it is correlated quite closely to the increase in the availability of food in the modern world.

Even though some countries are heavier than others, it is on the rise everywhere.

Nope. It's correlated with a culture of eating junk food. Societies with strong "good diet" culture have the lowest obesity rating, despite a lot of them being in the richest bracket (France and especially Japan for example).
Also, the outbreak of obesity is a really recent thing (30-40 years at most), despite food availability in the first world countries being very high for a much longer time.