The reasons for the increase in overweight and obesity are complex. Although overweight and obesity are mainly a result of individual behaviors and choices, the environments in which we live affect our behaviors and choices. Social and environmental changes have occurred that have led to decreased physical activity and increased food consumption.
The Home Environment
The family home is a critical setting to learn about proper nutrition and adequate physical activity. Habits, attitudes, and beliefs about food choices and how to spend family leisure time are critical to forming a healthy relationship with food. Modern life has resulted in the following changes which can lead to excessive food consumption and decreased physical activity.
- Increase in daily screen time (television, computers, video games)
- Increased marketing of high-calorie and low-nutrient foods and beverages
- Increase in soft drink consumption
- Increase in food and beverage portion sizes
- Increase in between-meal snacking.
- Decrease in meals prepared and eaten at home
- Decrease in breast feeding duration
The School Environment
Children spend a large part of their day in school and their food choices while at school are influenced by the school eating environment. Over the past decade, less students have participated in the National School Meals Program and more low nutrition “competitive foods”, those available in addition to United States Department of Agriculture (USDA)-provided school meals, are available at school. The prevailing trends are as follows.
- Increase in parents driving children to school
- Increased availability of less nutritious “competitive foods”, those available in addition to United States Department of Agriculture (USDA)-provided school meals, such as soft drinks and high calorie snacks foods
- Decreased student participation in the National School Meals Program
- Decreased time in school for physical education, nutrition education, and physical activity
The Worksite Environment
Since the average American adult spends at least 40 hours a week at work, it is important to address physical activity and nutrition in the worksite. Worksites have responded to the challenge, and by 1999, a total of 95 percent of national worksites with 50 or more employees offered nutrition, weight management classes, or counseling at the worksite or through their health plans. Individual efforts to eat healthy and move more at the worksite are confounded by the following.
- Increase in people living farther away from workplace, thus spending more time commuting (usually by driving instead of healthy alternatives such as walking/biking)
- Worksites are increasingly automated and many jobs are sedentary
- Increased availability of soft drinks and high calorie snacks and foods at worksites
The Neighborhood Environment
Modern lifestyles contribute greatly to physical inactivity. Cars are used for short trips, and the number of walking trips the average American adult takes each year decreased 42 percent between 1975 and 1995. This was also true for American children, who decreased walking trips by 37 percent. Today only 10 percent of public school students walk to school compared to the majority of students a generation ago. Neighborhood challenges to obtaining the recommended amount of physical activity include the following.
- Neighborhood design not conducive to walking or biking
- Increased number of neighborhoods that are perceived as unsafe
- Increased time spent in automobiles
Despite a high level of public attention and concern, and a fairly good understanding of factors that contribute to the dramatic increase in overweight and obesity, decision makers in both the public and private sectors have been hesitant to address the problem. In some ways, the responses to obesity as a public health problem have been similar to early responses to the 1964 Surgeon General’s Report on Tobacco. Several common responses are: lack of acceptance by some that obesity causes serious health problems; the belief that obesity is solely the “fault” of the individual; and the belief that there is no social, corporate, or governmental responsibility to reverse the problem.
Our policy and decisions makers, families, communities, schools, worksites, health care systems, and the media must unite to make the healthy choice the easy choice where Utahns live, learn, work, and play.
For more information, see Tipping the Scales Toward a Healthier Population: The Utah Blueprint to Promote Healthy Weight for Children, Youth, and Adults (May 2006)
