Media has greatly improved from years past that affects the obesity rate of children today because of the lack of physical activity with these devices, parents not overseeing their child’s limit with technology use, and television programs enticing the younger audience to live life and eat whatever you want.
Television, in general, have affected the young children in our generation where television programs entices the children to eat whatever you want. On television, when there’s a program on, television channels will run ads with food in it which may cause the childhood obesity rate increase. You may ask “how does the ad increase the obesity rate?”. Well, it’s pretty simple since food ads nowadays aim at younger children to entice them to eat their food. For example, when fast food ads come on, it makes the children and people want to eat it even though the food is probably high on fat, sugar, sodium, and high in calories. They also manipulate the ads so that the food looks as delicious as it can be. And it works. They only show these commercials because these companies want to maximize their profits and earn the most amount of money they can. Adding on to this, these advertisements ran by the program can exploit the eating habits and the foods in the commercial because children under 8 years of age can’t distinguish persuasive nature so they will want the food. Another reason why television increase obesity rate is because the amount of time spent on devices and social media has greatly increased due to evolving technology which impacts how long children spend on these devices. For every hour children spend watching something on television, they have a increased chance of being obese by 7%. This is because when you’re watching television, you’re probably going to have a snack where the more amount of time you spend watching, the more food you’re going to eat due to unhealthy snacking habits.
Over time, technology has improved greatly where nowadays, children have gotten used to using technological devices that has impacted their physical workout activities. A reason why the obesity rate increases as physical workout decrease is because people will want to stay inside and play their video games or be on social media. Because of these video games and these devices, people would rather be inside and be playing their favorite games instead of being outside and having fun with their friends. With these games, you can even have more fun than with your friend because these games have been evolving from the gameplay, the visual graphics, and the overall excitement of playing the game. Because of this, time is more spent playing these games than going outside and doing some physical activity. I can back this up because over 60% of Children under the age of 2 uses media and 43% of children in the United States watches television everyday. This is how the obesity rate increases because people don’t get their workout in. Another reason why low physical workout can lead to an increase in obesity is because of certain video games and apps. Children will decide to play those games instead of doing physical activity since the video games and apps are more likely fun nowadays. Since there are video game companies, there are devices which help get the person get fit so people would think they wouldn’t need to go outside. For example, their is a system that is called Wii Fit that does physical activities and Xbox has Kinect where it makes a person do things in real life to progress in the video game. Also, back in the 1970s when younger children got bored, they would go outside and play tag with their friends, but now, they just sit around and text their friends or play games all day because new devices have grown onto them.
There has been an increase of social media apps that the younger generation of children have stuck with since they have been released. A reason for this is that the younger children have the ability to talk to their friends without getting up and going outside to play with them. Social media apps like twitter and Facebook where children can talk to each other and gather news. There is also the rise of Snapchat and Instagram where they can also talk to each other and post pictures so they can past the time. Another reason why social media apps increase the obesity rate is because children can pass the time where they can watch movies or videos on their electronic devices while laying in bed or sitting on the couch while eating food. This happens because there has been the rise of Netflix where anyone can watch shows or movies whenever they want in order to pass the time. There has also been the rise of YouTube in 2005 where children can watch their favorite people while also laying in bed or even on their gaming devices where these gaming companies integrated the app onto their system. People can gain weight because of these social media apps because all they do is nothing and I’ve seen many people watch Netflix and eat for hours on end to get done with a show’s season or a movie. This is how the obesity rate can rise due to people not doing anything while watching a movie or show.
Although social media impacts the obesity rate, the media can also help people get out of their physical shape and make them look good if the media is presented in the right way. A reason why social media can stop obesity rate is because if social media is used correctly, the media can be shifted towards the positive aspects of all types of people regarding weight. It has been shown that if you are presented with a person not being overweight, there is no reaction and that overweight person won’t be down on themselves which in part could stop them from binge eating. So people that goes on the internet can stop looking at overweight people where that person won’t get bullied about their weight which lowers their depression rate which effectively lowers the chance of being obese. The internet also provides many ways people can lose weight, therefor having the possibility of reducing the obesity rate.
In the end, the media can have a tremendous role in increasing the obesity rate because of the increase of social media apps, television programs aiming at children to eat certain food, and the lack of physical activity. But the media can be good if perceived in the right way.
