The most I can hope anyone takes away from this blog is an understanding of the multiple forces pushing Western societies towards obesity. These forces are:
So in summary, People are becoming overweight and obese in modern societies because out bodies are not adapted to the energy patterns of our environment.
However, understanding this can be the first step in overcoming the problem. Knowing that obesity is caused by contradictions with your biology and the surrounding environment, there are steps that can be taken to either reverse the issue or prevent it in the first place.
Since we can't change out biology, our only option is to alter our environment. Unfortunately, this is not necessarily easy and requires a lot of effort on your part.
So the surrounding environment leads to over consumption, and under exertion. This means the aspects of your surroundings that need to be changed are pretty simple: Eat higher quality food in modest proportions and/or increase physical activity to a level where daily energy burned is greater than total energy intake.
I am aware that every know that to lose weight you need to eat less and exercise more, but by looking at the issue from this Anthropological perspective, the problem may become simplified and some individuals may become motivated to get healthier.
The Following youtube video was created by the CDC and does a great job at summarizing the points I have made and gives suggestions of ways to get healthier.
- Our evolutionary drive to eat whatever we can, especially sugars, fats, and salt
- Food available for consumption is of low-quality, has high energy content (which we crave), and is significantly different from natural foods that we co-evolved with
- Modern urban societies do not promote, or even discourage physical activity
- This creates an energy imbalance within the body, as too much energy is consumed, and too little energy is exerted
- Our bodies respond to this mismatch by storing the extra energy as fat
So in summary, People are becoming overweight and obese in modern societies because out bodies are not adapted to the energy patterns of our environment.
However, understanding this can be the first step in overcoming the problem. Knowing that obesity is caused by contradictions with your biology and the surrounding environment, there are steps that can be taken to either reverse the issue or prevent it in the first place.
Since we can't change out biology, our only option is to alter our environment. Unfortunately, this is not necessarily easy and requires a lot of effort on your part.
So the surrounding environment leads to over consumption, and under exertion. This means the aspects of your surroundings that need to be changed are pretty simple: Eat higher quality food in modest proportions and/or increase physical activity to a level where daily energy burned is greater than total energy intake.
I am aware that every know that to lose weight you need to eat less and exercise more, but by looking at the issue from this Anthropological perspective, the problem may become simplified and some individuals may become motivated to get healthier.
The Following youtube video was created by the CDC and does a great job at summarizing the points I have made and gives suggestions of ways to get healthier.
Make sure you check out the final blog post, as we compile all the information and find an answer to my two questions.