Rudd Sound Bites

Weight-Related Bullying in Kids

by Chelsea Heuer

In 1994 the National Education Association stated:

“For fat students, the school experience is one of ongoing prejudice, unnoticed discrimination, and almost constant harassment.”

Bullying in schools is a serious problem - kids who are “different” are picked on, put down, teased, humiliated, ignored, even terrorized and physically injured.

I recently attended the Stand Up to Bullying Forum in Hartford, CT hosted by the Connecticut Commission on Children. The most memorable part of the event was hearing several young adults telling their heart-breaking accounts of the terror they faced when they were adolescents – being tormented because of their ethnicity, physical disability, sexual orientation, size or religion.

Weight bias….for infants?

by Kathryn Henderson

How early do we begin to indoctrinate individuals with weight bias? I recently observed an interesting phenomenon in my daycare center. My 7 ½ month-old daughter is in a room with three other babies, one girl and two boys. My daughter happens to be tall (I believe they call it “long” when you’re not yet standing) but petite and delicate-featured, and on the slim side. The other little girl is two months younger but quite a sturdy little baby, already a few pounds heavier than my older but slight daughter. Of course, this other little girl is absolutely adorable. The parents of the two baby boys often refer to my daughter as their baby’s girlfriend, noting that their boys have a “crush” on her. This is never said of the sturdier little girl. I can’t help but suspect that size is playing a role here, even at this young age – for girls, small and petite is more attractive, while stocky is not “feminine”. These are kind, loving, well-educate parents….and yet we fall so easily into assuming stereotypes.

The heritability of "neophobia"

by Meghan O'Connell

People love to point the finger at parents whose kids abhor vegetables, eschew whole grain goodness in favor of white flour, love chemical laden concoctions, and go out of their way to get their hands on salty, fatty snacks.  Are parents unfairly blamed for the inadequacy of their kid’s diets? I think so for many reasons; a recent article in The New York Times highlights one of them.

Have It Your Way…or Maybe Not

by Becca Krukowski

In traveling home from a wedding recently, I found myself hungry in the Atlanta airport.  After surveying the limited healthy and vegetarian choices, I decided upon the veggie burger at Burger King.  I was fascinated by the response when I tried to place my order:

“Huh?”

Warning: this size may be hazardous to your health

by Beth Rocchio

Cigarette wrappers have them.  Alcoholic beverages have them.  Even casinos have them.  We are all familiar with warnings about how certain substances and behaviors may be unhealthy.

Using a similar approach as with other human excesses such as smoking, drinking and gambling, British health experts have proposed that large-sized clothing ought to contain warning labels on their tags with a telephone number to call for help with overeating. “What fat people need is help, advice and sympathy to overcome their addiction to food”, their report reads.  Click here for the complete article. 

Nutrition Sells

by Victoria Brescoll

An article in The New York Times last month reported on a grocery store chain in Maine, The Hannaford Company, that over a year-long period let consumers know which products were more (or less) healthy by placing “stars” next to them.  The healthiest products (those lowest in saturated and trans fats, those that contained whole grains, were low in added sugars, high in fiber, etc.) received up to 3 stars while less healthy products received anywhere between 0 and 2 stars.

Find your neighborhood's "walk score"

by Marlene Schwartz

I was just looking at the most recent newsletter from Active Living Research, and they reported on an online tool where you can type in an address and get the "walk score" of the neighborhood.  It looks at a map of the area around the address and calculates how walkable the neighborhood is by measuring how far it is to walk to places like restaurants, fitness centers, libraries, stores, etc.   This is a pretty neat resource for both individuals and researchers.

Collaboration, Competition, and Elephants

by Beth Rocchio

“What we can do with public policy is incredible.  Isn’t it ridiculous that those guys in the labs are getting money for feeding rats sugar?” I actually heard this comment from a public health official at a conference last year.  A year later, at the Harvard Obesity Conference, I heard about many different views of the obesity epidemic.  Most people seem to choose a view and cling to it (like an addiction).  They believe the problem, and therefore the solution, is either genetic or environmental, biochemical or psychological, too little exercise or too much food, metabolic or nutritional, emotional or even spiritual.

Why Isn’t Education Enough?

by Jennifer Pomeranz

We read it over and over again: Education alone does not change eating behavior. Marion Nestle has a great article showing how many precise changes are needed to just take a family from using whole milk to a low-fat version.  But why are humans so unable to make small changes that they are in total control of?  Some point to will-power.  But why is it so hard?  I do not have an answer- only the question.  I know that eating a jar of peanut butter in two days is not the best idea but if it’s in the house it is hard to resist.  I can order healthy meals at restaurants, but if someone else orders dessert and four spoons, I am happy to oblige.  Where does the system break-down?

Not So Easy to Just Say No

by Marlene Schwartz

The Kaiser Family Foundation released a report recently on the amount of food advertising that children are exposed to each year. One of the interesting trends is that 20% of ads direct children to go to the company’s website. I have been amazed in my own house at how much my children know about different websites, and how easily they get drawn into them.

Cereal, It's What's for Dinner

by Michael Long

As part of a research project evaluating the food environments of Connecticut high schools, we conducted focus groups with current students.  Beyond the general complaints about food quality in the school system, what struck me the most were reports about meal timing and the quantity of cereal consumption.

New! Improved?

by Roberta Friedman

We saw it coming a few years ago, when the Oreos Hundred-Calorie Pack showed up in school vending machines and grocery stores.  Now, the junk food industry has gone whole hog.  They’ve reformulated over 10,000 snack products to have a little less sugar and fat, and packaged them in smaller amounts. This highly processed junk food now meets updated nutrition standards for calories, fat, and sugar set by many school systems and several states for foods sold outside the school meal programs.  So, for example, despite legislation passed in 2005 in California, which was supposed to ban junk food and sodas from schools, the state's public school students can still make a meal out of potato chips and cookies, albeit it lower-calorie, lower-fat chips and cookies.   They’re what the industry is calling “better-for-you” foods.

Walmart: A little less bad?

by Christopher Wharton

I recently attended a talk by Leslie Dach, Executive Vice President of Corporate Affairs and Government Relations for Walmart Stores, Inc.  During his presentation, this former advocate for environmental issues talked about everything Walmart is doing to minimize its “environmental footprint.”  The company has committed, he said, to becoming more environmentally friendly.  The talk raised the interesting issue of corporate responsibility in my mind, and I’m curious to know what you think...

Moving beyond the personal responsibility debate

by Jennifer Otten

The reader comments to a recent article posted on ABC News titled “Obesity Threatens Emergency Services” have me taking a closer look at our dialogue on obesity issues. Why? A number of readers, who identified themselves as healthcare personnel, underscored many of the challenges described in the article while the other responses ranged from personal responsibility finger-pointing to indignant outcry, stating things such as “If fat people are denied medical care they need, who's next? Smokers? Drinkers? Old people?”

What is American food?

by Becca Krukoswki

If you asked someone to describe American food, what do you think that he would say? Perhaps “hamburger,” “hotdog,” “barbecued pork” (or for those of us in the South, that’s just barbecue), “meatloaf,” or maybe just a blank look?  Try this experiment with your friends and family; the responses can be fascinating.