Eating behaviour is a complex behaviour that involves a vast array of factors which has a great impact on the way we choose our meals. Food choice, like an other behaviour, is influenced by several interrelated factors. While hunger seems to drive our ways of food consumption, there are things outside of our own bodies that influence our food choices and the way in which we eat. The way we eat is controlled by and is a reflection of our society and cultures. I explore this idea through a food diary I created over a few weeks and the observations made by several anthropologists that I have studied.
The way in which we choose our foods can stem from events that occur during early childhood. When I lived in Jamaica as a child, I was
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I eventually grew to like the taste in later years. The incorporation of these childhood 'treats' came be seen in the food diary that I kept. They had become a familiar part of my diet as I began to demonstrate brand loyalty. I had a preference of KFC over Burger King and McDonalds, Pizza Hut over Pizza Pizza, etc.
A close examination of the food diary allowed people to see that our family tended to have large meals to together only on Sundays and sporadic, smaller meals on other days. This was partially due to culture and the socialization of food. Keeping up with the fast pace lifestyle created a different schedule types for the family members, hence, different eating patterns. Many people of the North American society still try to enforce family time where they eat together. They cling to the ideal that families eating together fixes personal and societal ills (smoking, obesity, children's vulnerability to drugs, etc.) and that it is a way to kindle children's success in school (Ochs, Elinor, and Beck 2013:49). During the week, snack items and small meals made up my diet. This was quick and easy food preparation was one of the issues, apart from schedules, that stopped our family from eating together. When families are at home other reasons stop them from eating together. Reasons such as convenient snacks in home creating individualized meals or snacks for family members and family dinnertime giving way to
In this research paper we will be looking at the topic of obesity and the social ramifications that it holds. We will first look at obesity in a broad way. Then we will focus on obesity and its effects on children. And finally, obesity and adulthood will be covered. The topic of obesity is important to the field of sociology because obese people make up a significant portion of the world’s population. In addition, the manner in which obese people are treated has a significant effect on society as a whole.
In these circumstances, when parents attempt to limit children’s ingestion of these foods, they may be inadvertently be reinforcing the children’s desire to consume these unhealthy nutriments (Birch & Fisher, 1998). Other investigators have concluded that when parents leave food selection to the preference of the child, the children often choose a sizable quantity of food of meager nutritional value (Klesges, Stein, Eck, Isbell, & Klesges, 1991).
The importance of cultures and tradition as part of our everyday life, influence us to make certain food choices. The types of our daily life, work and education, size of the family and the importance of hospitality within the social group are also important when we make food choices. This then leads Family functions act highly on socialisation in terms of what society values. There is always a relation concerning what the society thinks and how people think about what they eat.
Obesity has been a growing problem in the U.S. for more than a decade. Various reasons and theories are thrown around as to the cause of this severe problem by psychologists, dietitians, and professors trying to pinpoint a single cause. Due to America’s vast supply of resources, luxurious living standards, and moral of the country, there is no one cause for obesity contrary to advertisements offering a quick-fix drug. America’s obesity problem is rooted much deeper than just cheap fast food and poor choices. Medical conditions, influence of genes, unhealthy lifestyles, and mental illnesses are all contributors towards obesity in any one person. Obesity is a serious problem in America with multiple contributors and one lone solution
Food is used in different circumstances in life represents a culture, but can also reflect one's personality, lifestyle, and socio-economic
My earliest memory of food is lentils and rice cooked in a pressure cooker. Lentils were cooked at least three days a week. Other days we had different vegetable curries, curd and more rice. This was what I took to school as my lunch every day. As I grew older and started caring more about my social life and people around me, I started noticing what my classmates brought for lunch from their homes. I started understanding how food reflected different cultures and communities. One day, in our
Why do Americans overeat to the point of becoming obese and what are the effects on the body? As the world looks at society today, clearly Americans have an issue with being overweight and becoming obese especially compared with other countries. “Approximately 17% (or 12.5 million) of children and adolescents aged 2—19 years are obese,” and “more than one-third of U.S. adults (35.7%) are obese” (Centers of Disease Control and Prevention, 2013, Data and Statistics).
Obesity does not discriminate against social status, sex, or race; it can take a person’s life and turn it upside down in the blink of an eye if they are not careful. Some people think of obesity as a worldwide killer because there is no outrunning it if it overtakes a person’s body. Every 1 in 3 adults are obese right here in America, that should give each and every individual some type of hint that there is a major problem occurring. The obesity epidemic is not something that has just caught the attention of people recently; it has been going on since the 1950’s! This epidemic is a major problem; over 2.8 million people die each year as a result of being obese or extremely overweight and over 40 million children were said to be obese in
This essay will discuss the social facilitation of eating for Anja, as an attendee to a dinner party with her wife. The dinner party is being held for Anja’s wife’s friend’s birthday at a restaurant that Anja has never attended before. There are twelve attendee’s, but Anja only knows her wife and her wife’s friend. We know that Anja is of normal body weight and may experience high levels of trait empathy. According to the literature, the social context of eating is a leading determinant of how much an individual will eat (Redd and de Castro, 1992). Research suggests that meals consumed in social settings tend to be longer in duration and can be up to 60% larger than meals consumed alone (Redd and de Castro, 1992). There is a strong indicator that various macronutrients, such as fat and sodium, increase significantly when people eat together, (Redd and de Castro, 1992), particularly in restaurant settings (de Castro, Brewer, Elmore and Orozco, 1990). However, there does seem to be some variation in amounts eaten dependent upon the significance of the eating companion, may they be a friend, spouse, family, friend, co-worker or another less familiar companion. Studies demonstrate that social influence has significant impacts upon the level of food intake regardless of time, place and previous hunger etc. Recent literature trends towards the bearing of social acceptance upon habitual dietary behaviours, as well as highlighting particular personality traits (e.g. trait empathy,
Meal’s when I was a young child were family oriented, however Mom worked full time and my older sisters were generally in charge of meals Monday through Friday with Mom cooking on the weekends. As my sisters grew up, the two oldest are seven and eight years older than I am, they became busy in activities, got jobs and family time at meals lessened. By adolescents my sisters were out of the house or working. My grandparents were deceased. My step dad was a truck driver and not at home a lot and Mom started working two jobs, family meals were lost.
There are many different biological approaches that explain the reasons for eating disorders they all have some validity behind them to a certain extent. An eating disorder is a psychological dysfunction that causes a person to change their eating habits to eating less, or more etc.
I grew up in Ethiopia in a family of six children and two adults until I became 16. When I was 16, I came to the U.S. since then I could see how my ethnic, culture, geography, and/or religion background affects my diet. I would say my diet was/still affected by my tradition or ethnic, and culture. For instance, when I grew up, my mother was a housewife and my father the only person was working and bringing food on the table because they believe women should stay home and raised children. Because of this reason we haven’t had sufficient income to buy verity of foods (fruits and vegetables) for the entire family. I haven’t had “healthy” or “nutritious” meals often, I may have three to four times in a month or sometimes none. When I was in
This article gives a basic definition of bulimia, which states that it is the act of binge eating and then purging in a n effort to prevent weight gain. It also says that the physiological thinking behind this disorder has yet to be discovered. Over al the article and its context seem to be reliable it often refers to research and experiments that have been
In recent years there has been a growing epidemic of obesity, especially in America. According to the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey posted on the Center for Disease Control website there are 12.5 million children from ages 2 through 19 that are obese. Many people are starting to complain that the commercials and ads for these restaurants are the result of such an incline in obesity. Although there have been current ad campaigns aiming at children to live a healthy life style there are still hundreds of advertisements that are putting restaurants in a sort of ultimatum position. Either restaurants change their advertisements or they improve their menus. In 1979 McDonalds debuted their world famous Happy Meals to the
I had the privilege of growing up in a foreign country. On the fish-shaped island of Bali in Indonesia I ate fish freshly caught from the sea, rice from the rice paddies in my backyard and experienced the coconut in all of its fruitful glory. I was adapted to the divine and overwhelming taste of Indonesian food and continued to eat under the illusion that all food must taste just as