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Who is to blame for the obesity epidemic?

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A constant blame game surrounds the obesity problem in the United States. Fast food restaurants tend to take a lot of the heat for Americans’ growing waistlines, but is it really their fault?

Two food economists set out find out more and conducted a survey.

They found most people believe individuals are to blame for their own obesity, not restaurants, grocery stores, farmers, or government policies.

“Based on our study results, the more likely conclusion is that consumers’ beliefs about who is to blame for obesity don’t necessarily align with the beliefs of policy makers and public health advocates. In the United States, we’re known for being an individualistic-based society, so it’s not exceptionally surprising that we would put this responsibility for obesity on ourselves,” said University of Illinois researcher Brenna Ellison in a press release.

Researchers also determined creating and enforcing public policies to help reduce obesity and/or encourage healthier food choices may not be as effective as policy makers would like.

“Obesity is in the news every day so it would be hard to say that people are unaware of the policy initiatives in place to reduce U.S. obesity rates,” said Ellison.

They hoped this online survey helped answer some of the questions previous research could like

  • Why aren’t these policies working?
  • Why aren’t consumers responding to increased soda prices?
  • Why aren’t consumers responding to calorie information on menus?

Researchers analyzed an online survey administered by Clear Voice Research whose survey participants are representative of the U.S. population in terms of socioeconomic characteristics, gender, and region.

Of the more than 800 Americans who took the survey, 774 were usable.

The main question of interest asked survey participants, “Who is primarily to blame for the rise in obesity?”

Respondents were asked to classify seven different entities as either primarily to blame, somewhat to blame, or not to blame for obesity.

Those entities included:

  • Individuals
  • Parents
  • Farmers
  • Food manufacturers
  • Grocery stores
  • Restaurants
  • Government policies

Researchers found 94 percent of people believed individuals are primarily or somewhat to blame for the rise in obesity and parents came in second at 91 percent.

Survey respondents felt farmers and grocery stores were relatively blameless for the rise in obesity.

“We learned that farmers and people who received food stamps were more likely to blame government and farm policy,” said Ellison. “That seems off. You wouldn’t expect that opinion from people who are benefiting from those policies; however, these individuals could be in the best position to observe the potential harm that some government policies create.”

The new study, “Who is to blame for the rise in obesity?,” is published in Appetite.


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