4 Articles- Deborah Cate

Superville, Darlene. “First Lady Begins Fight Against Childhood Obesity.” The Seattle Times 9 February 2010. Web. 10 October 2010.
First lady Michelle Obama unveils her national public awareness campaign against childhood obesity. She talks about how her campaign has four parts: helping parents make better food choices, serving healthier food in school vending machines and lunch lines, making healthy food more available and affordable, and encouraging children to exercise more. Because one in three American children is obese she wants to do something about it. This article will be helpful to my research because it deals with childhood obesity and the actions that America is taking to reduce it.

Jalonick, Mary Clare. “Childhood Obesity Still Rising andParents don’t see it.” The Seattle Times 29 June 2010. Web 10 October 2010.
An annual obesity report shows that an increasing awareness of obesity and its threat to public health has not become apparent to adults with children. Nearly 84 percent of parents believe their children are at a healthy weight. This report talks about the rise of adult obesity and how it translates to their children. This article will be helpful to me because it does talk about the lack of parental awareness in children, and how this can lead to obesity.

Klein, Sarah. “Are Sports Drinks Part of a Healthy Teen Lifestyle?” CNN: Health.com. 27 September 2010. Web. 10 October 2010.
The marketing strategy targeted to children and teens for sports drinks has a positive effect. Showing the world class athletes drinking these drinks cause teens that are athletic, to consume sports drinks. The studies in the article show that colored drinks are more appealing to teens than water, and although the sports drinks contain carbohydrates and electrolytes, they also have a lot of sugar. The sports drinks are not considered to be too much healthier than soda, containing almost the same amount of sugar. This article will be helpful to me, because it talks about how the popular healthy sports drinks can even have false portrayals and can lead to children becoming obese. This also ties in with the media giving false information, and persuading children’s motivations about food.

Park, Madison. “NY officials: Take soda out of food stamp program.” CNN: Health.com. 7 October 2010. Web. 10 October 2010.
New York City is proposing to exclude sugar-sweetened beverages such as sodas and sports drinks from food stamp eligibility, because of their effects on obesity. The studies in the article show that the most food stamp recipients drank more than one sugar-sweetened beverage a day and experienced higher obesity rates. By not allowing these beverages to be eligible there will be more money to spend on foods and drinks that provide real nourishment. This article will help me in my research because it shows that even the very low income families, surviving off of food stamps will still resort to high sugar, high fat foods. The effect that the society and the media have on the non-nutritious foods over powers the nutritious foods that people should be eating.