Eating behavior will be discussed

Ohio State Marion invites the public to attend the second monthly installment of Science Café, a free community dialogue on science, at 7 p.m. Tuesday (12/4) at the Rise & Dine Restaurant, Legacy Crossing, 142 McMahon Boulevard, Marion. Tracy Tylka, professor of psychology at Ohio State Marion, will discuss “Eating Behavior in the U.S.” Tylka will share her views and research on the attitudes and practices of parents and caregivers and how attitudes help shape children's future eating behavior.

From her web page:

Tracy Tylka is an Associate Professor of Psychology at the Marion Campus of The Ohio State University. She attended The University of Akron for her undergraduate and graduate studies, earning her B.A. in 1995, her M.A. in 1998, and her Ph.D. in Counseling Psychology in 2001. As a part of her graduate studies, she completed her pre-doctoral internship at the Southern Illinois University-Carbondale counseling center. After finishing her internship, she was happy to return to Ohio to pursue her teaching, research, and service interests.

At The Ohio State University, she teaches classes in abnormal psychology, psychology of women, personality, counseling psychology, and general psychology. Within each class, she discusses the impact of sociocultural, psychological, biological, and relational factors on behavior. She also supervises students’ independent studies and honors’ theses (mostly focusing on body image and eating behavior). Many of her honors students have presented their findings at the American Psychological Association annual conferences and published their work in peer-reviewed academic journals such as the Journal of Counseling Psychology, Body Image: An International Journal of Research, Psychology of Women Quarterly, and Psychology of Men and Masculinity.

Eating in the dark

On my way to the coffee shop (6:15 a.m.) I waited at a long light change and glanced in the rear view mirror at the driver waiting behind me. It was a 5-way intersection and we were the only people there. I couldn't see her body, but I could see she was carefully removing wrapped food from a fast bag, probably White Castle, which is the only thing around here open that early. She seemed to be laying them out on the passenger seat. I saw 4 items by the time the light changed. I went straight and she went left, but we both entered the same parking lot from opposite ends. I thought she was going to eat there before heading for work. When I left the coffee shop her car was still there, so she was apparently employed in one of the other stores and perhaps opened. Which ever, she ate breakfast alone in her car in the dark. Not a healthy choice.

American obesity has leveled off, according to the news--33% of men and 35% of women are obese. How you eat is very important according to Brian Wansink, the new Executive Director of the USDA Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion. If you are serious about eating a healthier diet, stopping at a drive through and eating out of a bag in the dark in an almost empty parking lot is probably not a good start to your day or the rest of your life.

Diets aren't easy, but this is

Yesterday I walked 5 miles. I know that because I was wearing a step pedometer, and only one mile was "exercise" done outside. The rest was my normal activities at home, and going out twice to shop. This week I read, "Using pedometers to increase physical activity and improve health" (a review article) in the Nov 21, 2007 issue of JAMA, pp 2296-2304 (many public libraries have a subscription). The researchers had reviewed 26 published studies that reported on pedometers among outpatients, 8 randomized controlled trials, and 18 observational. The conclusion was that use of a pedometer is associated with significant increases in physical activity and significant decreases in body mass index and blood pressure. This was across all ages, races, gender, and state of health.

Some guidelines specifically recommend 10,000 steps a day, although I don't know that this goal would change the outcome. So, if you're like me and exercise isn't your thing, clip on that pedometer. I'm not sure why it works, but people, me included, seem to increase their activity level when using a pedometer.

The financial picture of fat

Forbes.com has this to say about the financial implications of obesity:

Six in 10 people in the United States are overweight, with a third crossing the boundary into obesity. The extra weight leads to at least 100,000 deaths annually. Obese people are at a much higher risk for heart attacks, strokes, diabetes, arthritis and some cancers. . . .

The economic cost of all this extra fat is immense. Direct medical costs are easiest to calculate, coming in at $93 billion, or 9%, of our national medical bill. But there are other costs as well that are harder to pin down.

The social cost.

Mike Huckabee, the big loser

I support Mike Huckabee to be the next president of the United States, and yesterday he moved to 3rd among Republican candidates, behind Rudy and Thompson. However, he was making news in 2004 for becoming a "big loser" after being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. He changed his diet and began exercising regularly. I think his philosophy that we have no quick fixes in our personal life will carry over well to the White House.

"This is a process," Huckabee said. "There will never come a day where you can say, 'Wow! I can wipe my brow, call it quits and go back to my ways because I have done this thing.' That is critical to know. Everybody wants a quick fix and something that doesn't require any change or any effort." (Wapo)