"Childhood Obesity: Is Advertising to Blame?"

"Children are exposed to $13 billion of food advertising every year, according to a professor of food and resource economics at the University of Florida." WHOA!! That is a shocking statistic. This article talked about children's exposure to advertisements and its affect on what they eat. The most interesting part of this article was this part about an experiment that she conducted on her niece. Her oldest niece Taylor is in love with princesses, but refused to eat fruits. Taylor's mom recently found packaged grapes with princesses on the cover and Taylor had no trouble eating them. Taylor was influenced by advertising because she only wanted to eat things that had to do with princesses. If the princesses were eating them, she would eat them. This just goes to show that advertising affects what children eat and what they want to eat. The website to this article is:

http://tracyshealthandfitnessblog.blogspot.com/2007/09/childhood-obesity-is-advertising-to.html

Public Blog Response

So....this assignment took me awhile to get started. Every blog I visited expected me to pay at least $50 to leave a simple little comment on the blog!! I went to 8 different websites and all of them told me I had to subscribe to them first to post a comment. Finally I landed on a blog that was from Blogger so I didn't have to pay. The site was called Television vs Children. It was written by a french lady so it wasn't perfect English but it was pretty good. This blog discussed the impact of advertising on child weight gain and was very well researched. It had a really good idea which was for parents to ask their child questions about the commercial when it came on so they knew the difference between commercials and shows. It would make the children aware of the ways that media and advertising people try to lure people in and it would keep them informed and aware.

The weblink to this site is: http://television-vs-children.blogspot.com/2006/11/advertising-impact-on-increaded-weight.html

My Civic Issue

As you can tell, my issue is childhood obesity. I have been looking for good websites that relate childhood obesity and how mass media portrays them for at least 3 days now and I am having the hardest time finding information. Every website and book that I look at talks about childhood obesity and the amount of TV they watch. I just got back from the library and i found some books that I think can give me a little help.

1) Childhood Obesity in the United States. Marie K. Frugier (Editor)

2) Cultural Studies: Medicine and Media. Lester d. Friedman (Editor)

3) Weight Bias: Nature, Consequences, and Remedies. Kelly D. Brownell (Editor)


I have looked at many different websites and read at least 35 different one's and have found some that relate somewhat to my research, but it seems like I am not going to find very many. A couple that I have found are:

1) The Role of Media in Childhood Obesity
http://www.kff.org/entmedia/upload/The-Role-Of-Media-in-Childhood-Obesity.pdf

2) Obesity News
http://www.medindia.net/news/Media-Say-Obesity-Is-Our-Own-Fault-27888-1.htm

3) Choice and Voice: Obesity Debates in Television News (This website is also a scholarly article).
http://www.mja.com.au/public/issues/187_08_151007/bon10486_fm.html

I think with these six sources, I am off to a good start, but it's going to take some time for me to find more scholarly articles that have to do with the way media portays obesity rather than the impact of television watching on obese children.

What is Academic Integrity?

When I first saw this question, I was really confused and really had no idea what it meant. I have never even heard of academic integrity until I read chapter 18 in "Everything's an Argument". Academic integrity means giving credit to the author whose information you use. It means citing things properly and making sure you don't plagiarize. Most of the time, what we write is our own words but in research papers, we need facts and information from reliable sources other than ourselves. We will be using MLA format for our upcoming papers and we need to know how to cite things properly so we do not get in trouble. Even if we paraphrase what the author said, we still must site it. Whenever we use information that is not our own, we have to write down where it came from. Common knowledge doesn't need to be cited because it is well known to everyone. Academic integrity is basically the same thing as plagiarism. It's just a different way of telling us to be honest about what we write and where we get our information from. Academic integrity sounds better than plagiarism because it is more official and shows us that we need to be honest in our work. Not plagiarizing is not the easist thing in the world, so in order to be our own words, we need to have integrity.

Engagement Hours

Well, well, well...now it's time to start thinking about what we can do about our issues. My issue is childhood obesity and the obvious answer would be to exercise and eat healthier, but it's not that easy. Nutrition in schools is an even bigger issue. School lunches tend to not be so healthy because their top priority is to make money, not to watch their children's weight. They buy their food in bulk, which can't be a good source of nutrition. Recently, California lawmakers have begun to combat the obesity problem by writing a bill that bans the sale of sodas in schools and sets requirements for food sold on campuses during school hours. Of course, this is only a baby step, but this is what it takes to get going. Tackling a problem as big as childhood obesity is no easy task, but it needs to be done. I was looking online for different things I could do for my engagement hours and a lot of the sites I found wanted money for everything. I don't want to just donate money and be done with it. That's not why I chose this topic. I want to do hands on activities and help people in person. How is my money going to help them lose weight and gain self-esteem? People want money for everything these days. I think I am going to volunteer at an after-school program somewhere. I haven't found any yet that I can do but if anyone has any idea's, please tell me and help me out!!!

Definition of Childhood Obesity

The simple definition of childhood obesity is an excess of body fat. For people like who me who need simple words to understand definitions, this works. Obesity is measured by the BMI scale. BMI stands for body mass index and compare a person's height with their weight. Ranges of BMI varies for everyone, including children. The BMI measures children ages two and over. Childhood obesity is seen as a big problem in the United States. Walk down any street or sidewalk and you can see that it is becoming an epidemic and needs to be controlled. Obesity can be caused by genetics, poor lifestyle, lack of exercise, along with many other causes, but these seem to be some of the main causes. Childhood obesity obviously starts at an early age, and therefore needs to be stopped at an early age. Trying to lose weight and watch what we eat is one of the hardest things to do, but in the long run will be worth it. The definition of childhood obesity can be interpreted many different ways but one thing that remains constant is the fact that it needs to be prevented and stopped.

Response to "Predicting Obesity in Young Adulthood from Childhood and Parental Obesity"

"Predicting Obesity in Young Adulthood from Childhood and Parental Obesity" is an article in The New England Journal of Medicine by Robert C. Whitaker. This article states a few main points: being obese as a child can increase the chances of being obese as an adult and being obese as an adult does have an affect on being obese as a child but researchers are not sure how. It seems to be basic common sense that obese parents will have a big impact on their children, but the extent will vary. Depending on how young the child is, the impact will be different. For a child that doesn't really know that much about nutrition, he/she will look to their parents for the best advice. If the child is older and more conscientious about what they eat, obesity can be stopped. Parents do have a big impact on their child's eating habits, whether they think they do or not. There were a lot of statistics in this article, but all of them basically saying that the rate of obesity is too high and needs ot be lowered. Like this was a new concept for everyone??

Response to "The Conversation: If you saw the numbers, would you still eat what you eat?"

This is a SacBee article that I found online. It mainly talks about how New York restaurants are now required to post calorie values on a board behind the counter. It allows people to know how much fat there is in the item they are about to consume. When people saw how many calories were in an item, they often changed their mind and went for something that was a little healthier. This is something that should be mandatory of restaurants across the United States, not just New York. Usually people already know how bad something is for them, but once they see it written down, maybe they are more apt to change their mind. They suggest that the one way to make sure we don't become obese is to exercise daily and watch what we eat. Now if only it was that easy. People who try to lose weight and people who don't even have to worry about losing weight have very different views on this subject. People who don't have to worry about their weight don't understand the hard work, dedication, and commitment it takes to drop the pounds. Losing weight is one of the hardest things to do.

Response to "Medicating Childhood Obesity"

This blog was about different ways to try and lower levels of obesity. One way they talk about is using drugs. WHAT?!?! Why do we need to drug up children just to control their weight? I think that is a little too drastic and is taking it way too far. Another way to stop this epidemic is to encourage physical activity. PE is now a requirement in high school, but is that really enough? I hated PE in high school. The first year I took it, we barely even walked every day. The second year I had it, we were required to do any of the following: 2 mile run, 1 mile run, 20 minute power walk, and push ups and sit ups. It was definitely better than the first year but I still believe it didn't much for me. Meals in schools need to be better also. Schools need to start serving more nutritious meals and encouraging children to want to eat healthy so they live longer. We need to act now or pay the unacceptable price later.

Response to "Childhood Obesity: The Educational Cost"

"If the current childhood obesity trend in the United States continues, by 2050, at least half the population will be obese and could very possibly be less educated than the overall population today". This is a very scary statistic because this is my generation. I do not want to grow up with half my generation missing. Once a child has become obese, they are less likely to pursue an education. Food in schools is terrible these days. Schools serve food that is cheap and has no nutritional value. Nowadays, there are certain laws that schools must follow but the standards are nowhere near where they should be. I remember in elementary school and middle school, I never ate school lunches. My mom always packed lunches for me and I hated it because the food looked so tasty. If I were to go back and see the food now, I would probably be very nauseated. It is very disgusting how they prepare it and shows how bad it is for you. The author of the blog blames a big part of childhood obesity on the parents. I agree with her view because parents should be watching out for their children so they live to be 50. Children need to learn at a young age because they are in control of their life too. Children when they reach a certain age understand obesity and the basics of it. I think childhood obesity is going to require a lot more work to fix than people think.

Intro to Blogging

My name is Geena Knutson and I am currently attending California State University, Sacramento. College is quite different than high school and Sacramento is defiinitely different than where I grew up. I am new to this whole blogging thing and I am still getting used to how it works. I created this blog site for my English 1A class that I am currently taking this semester. This class seems different than other English classes because we are allowed to get involved in the community. The main subject of this class is taking action in our community. There are many topics that I could have chosen, but the topic I decided to follow was childhood obesity. Childhood obesity is a controversial problem in our society. The United States is the most obese country in the world. Obviously, this is not something we should be proud of. Walk down any street, go to a park, or go to the grocery store and you will see what I mean. Childhood obesity is something we should take more initiative in and try to fix. This is why I chose this topic. If we don't do something now, there will be a generation of people missing from our society. I chose this topic to try and help to see that everyone my age lives to be 70, 80, and maybe even 90. I am very interested to see if this whole blogging idea helps me out in my study of childhood obesity.