FAT LOSS: ENVIRONMENTAL INFLUENCES
Summary of main points.
• Modern technological environments are associated with large increases in obesity in Western countries.
• Environments which influence overfatness can be categorised on size (‘macro’ or ‘micro’) and type (‘physical’ and ’socio-cultural’).
• Macro environments represent the broader national and international perspective; micro environments are within the immediate family, friends and community.
The influence of the environment on obesity was eloquently shown in a study of six villages in Papua New Guinea. Professor Paul Zimmett and his colleagues from Melbourne University developed an index of ‘modernity to measure how much modern technology was used in a particular population and to see if this is related to obesity levels. The ‘modernity’ index included measures of new technology use such as television and motor veto education levels, occupation, father’s employment, years living in an urban centre and type of housing and graded the six villages on their total modernity scores and correlated these with obesity levels as measured by body mass index (BMI). As the level of ‘modernity’ increased in a village, so did the level of fatness of the population. They concluded that while modern technology is something we might all strive towards for improved quality of life, it has significant side effects on health. This is due particularly to the decreases in physical activity, as well as the increased availability of high energy dense foods, particularly fatty processed foods.
The current environment in modern society in relation to obesity can be compared with that associated with cigarette smoking in the 1960s and 1970s. While individual and group ‘quit’ smoking programs had reasonable success at the individual level, they had little impact on smoking rates in most Western countries until population-wide measures were taken and public attitudes towards smoking changed. Legislation on smoke-free environments, advertising bans, price hikes and a range of other environmental changes have all been major contributors to the decreases in smoking.
There are a number of different environments—macro, micro, physical and socio-cultural—in which human beings operate. These, in turn, can affect aspects of fat/energy input (F/EI) such as food supply or availability, or fat/energy expenditure (F/EE), such as facilities for, and attitudes to, physical activity.
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