I teach an online nutrition class. Our discussion this week is about obesity.
One of my students brought up the debate about whether or not the government should be able to limit portion sizes in restaurants. Gotta love a good debate!
For example, should we get rid of “super-sized” portions in fast food restaurants? There is always controversy when it comes to the government “dictating” what we can or can’t put in our bodies.
So it got me thinking, who really dictates the food and beverages I put in my body every day? Is it me? Is it my friends? My co-workers? My family? Movie stars? Commercials? Big business? News anchors? Magazines? Radio hosts? Well, my answer would have to be.. all of the above and more.
So, you ask…. “I’m not choosing what foods I put into own my body???” Well sort of… It’s not to say that we don’t make some conscious decisions about our food choices, but for the most part our environment plays a huge role in what and how much food we put in our mouths every single day. In fact, there were cupcakes in the break room at work today. I ate one! Does this mean I have no self-control?! Who hasn’t asked themselves that same exact question before? But, if the cupcakes weren’t there, in my environment, self-control would have never been an issue.
Look at the soda industry. In a way they are already “dictating” what we put in our bodies. There is a lot of research out there showing that sugar is addicting. Once the soda company has us hooked, we keeping looking for bigger and bigger and BIGGER portions in order to get that sugar rush or sugar high. Research has linked sugar addition to the same receptors in the brain as drug addiction. So maybe we DO need to limit how much food or beverage is available for one portion. You can always go back for seconds, duh. But, at least you would have to go out of your way to go back for more and in some cases those few extra seconds will get you thinking, “Hey, you know what, I really don’t need any more soda”.
Most people mindlessly eat and drink. If you buy a small soda, you finish it, if you buy a large soda, you finish it. There is also sooooo much advertising out there, that we are always being bombarded with the idea that we are thirsty for a soda. Shut up advertising, I’m not thirsty for a soda! Or am I? <Sigh>
I recently read about some research done on movie theater popcorn. The researchers served people stale, what seemed like nasty tasting, popcorn for free. Who doesn’t like free stuff?? They gave some of the moviegoers a small bag of popcorn and they gave the others a large bag. And… as I’m sure you can guess, even though it wasn’t good popcorn, people ate it. And…. of course the people who were given the larger bags ate the most popcorn. In fact, they ate 53% more popcorn! So it shows, the larger the portion, the more we eat. (http://news.moviefone.com/2011/09/02/stale-movie-popcorn/)
So, what do you think? Who’s “dictating” what and how much food we put in our mouth? Do we need to put some sort of limit on portions? Or is educating people about the importance of portion control enough? Can we really “control” ourselves when it comes to our food and beverages choices?
