Third+Quarter+Benchmark

America seems to have been struck with a problem. A problem that involves it growth. This problem is obesity. It has struck many different individuals and groups. What seems to be causing the problem? There are many types of reasons responsible for this issue. Our Loving parents, the companies, or advertisements? There is no exact answer, but I will state the facts and add my own opinion at the end.

Could it be possible that the people that loves and care for us the most that live in our own homes be the cause of this disaster? It could be true. Children will always follow their parent’s path. UCLA center for health policy research say, “Contrarily teens whose parents eat fast food or drink soda are most likely to do the same.” Statistics show that “Everyday more than 2 million California adolescent(62%)drink soda and 1.4 million(43%) eat fast food, but only 38 percent eat five or more servings of fruit and vegetables…” This is according to the policy brief in, __Teen Dietary Habits Related to Those of Parents.__ In this policy brief it explains how, “Teens whose parents eat five serving of fruits and vegetables daily are 16 percent more likely to do the same than the teens whose parents don’t eat five servings or more a day.” Children learn from their parents. Dr. Robert K. Ross says, “This research shows us that one of the keys to solving the teen obese crisis start with the parents!!!” Educating parents about nutrition could reduce obesity in teens.

Basically a reason to eat anything you want is because of a person's lack of knowledge about nutrition and exersize. I f the companies hid that from Americans, they would have no clue, probibly think it was healthy food.It was tue that that most people thought that and also said in a documentary movie called Food Inc, clearly it was an impossible cause. Associated Press says,"NYC consumers tweaked diet choices aftercities calorie posting law." This law has cause American resturants to change and make the calorie count a lot less. Oliver Arizzi, the brand marketing manager of a bakery, Le Pain Quotidien says,"We would have had certain pastries that were very popular before, not being popular anymore because thre calorie count was too high." Compnaies cut the postion sizes in half to make calorie counts a lot less as well.

Advertisments don't you just love them? Companies are really smart to have them for they attract thier biggest group of customers,young children. New York times says,"Too much time on the television has long been linked to childhood obesity! The more televison comercials a child is exposed to, the more likely he or shewill be to try those food and want to continue eating them." Now lets get real how manyy hours of tv do children watch? My nine year old brother maybe four or more hours of tv a day, and that includes a lot of commercials.

In my opinion, all these obese related reasons all go back to one thing and it is education. Without the knowledge of what we are eating and where it comes from we can never live a healthy life, and then we take that clueless lifesyle an dpass it on to the next generations. Adressing the calories for meals had a lot og hope for change. Imagine what would happen if we educated parentds and gave a class to young teens.

We have so many reasons to blame compoanie parents or any elder, and comapnies. Should we really be our selves? The governements? Our parents? No one has a clue. Hoew can we solve this problem without knowing the cause of it.