Washing hands with hot water and soap helps protect against the spread of germs. Covering your nose and mouth when you sneeze or cough can help you avoid passing on a cold. But how can you avoid catching…obesity?
A recent study presented at the National Bureau of Economic Research meeting in Massachusetts found that obesity is actually contagious. Researchers looked at international data on Body Mass Index (BMI) and perception of weight. One of the key findings was that women’s satisfaction with their weight is closely tied with their perception of their own BMI as related to the BMI of other women in their country. Overweight men were happy when the men around them were also overweight. In a nutshell, according to lead researcher Dr. Andrew J. Oswald of the United Kingdom’s University of Warwick, “What we're finding is that human beings are probably driven tremendously by comparison."
These results, while not terribly surprising, present an interesting conundrum. While you can take steps to prevent catching other things, how do you avoid catching obesity? Are we supposed to find a new set of friends? Spend less time with our families? These solutions are probably impractical in the least and will most certainly make us pretty unpopular.
Maybe a different way to look at these findings is yet another push to start a new routine – help yourself and your friends/family at the same time. Instead of parties and outings that are based around food, think about making health a core part of your events. For example, bring a healthier dish to potluck parties or exchange healthy recipes and encourage friends to try them at parties. Choose healthier restaurants for lunch with coworkers or take walking meetings. Last year, a friend of mine and I started a new routine – before our weekend lunch and shopping dates, we started running. The new routine is infectious (pun intended).
If you have other ideas, please feel free to post a comment to this blog.
Kerry
