Mass Media Are Becoming Obese

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Obesity has become a major worldwide health problem. In fact, not just adults are becoming obese, many young children and teenagers are also increasingly becoming very obese. Being obese increases a person 's risk of many health problems and diseases such as diabetes. Why are people becoming obese at such a young age? Well, the reason for this is the media. Media plays a huge role in the current health care crises of rising rate of obesity and diabetes because the media influences a person’s food choices. Also, the development of mass media has been for the worse because children are always sitting in front of a screen and are beginning to forget the outdoors. Therefore, the mass media contributes for an individual to be obese and less active. …show more content…

Children who watch four or more hours of TV a day, have a higher body mass indices and thicker skin folds than those who watch fewer than two hours per day (Tepperman, Albanese, and Curtis 2012). By 2004, 26 per cent of adolescents, ages 2 to 17 were overweight compared with 15 per cent in 1978 (ibid). For the reason that the media was not a huge development many years ago, food manufacturers did not have the opportunity to influence people into purchasing their products. That is why the percentage of obese people was lower in 1978 than 2004. In addition, these percentages amount to almost half a million young people between 12 and 17 in Canada who are overweight or obese (ibid). Also, the odds of being obese increase with every hour spent in front of a television or computer screen, according to new research based on more than 42,600 adult Canadians (Nanaimo Daily News 2008). Furthermore, while viewing television, there is an increased snaking behavior and viewing television for long hours can interfere with an individual’s sleeping pattern. All of these can result a person to become obese or

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