Chapter 13 Flashcards
How have the obesity rates changed in five countries since 1980 (see figure 13.5)?
A comparison of obesity rates in Japan, Netherlands, Finland, United Kingdom, United States. Obesity rates have risen dramatically across the world during the past few decades, particularly in the United States and the United Kingdom. Japan has seen the least amount of change.
What is the French paradox, and what are some explanations for it from the video and the text?
The rate of obesity in the United States is about five times the rate in France. The typical French diet compared with American cuisine, is rich in fat, sugar heavy products such as cream, butter, cheese, foie gras, pastries, and chocolate. French tend to have higher blood cholesterol levels than Americans. The French have longer lifespan, are thinner, and have lower heart disease rates than Americans. The French eat significantly fewer calories per day than Americans.
What were the results of Rozin et al.’s study looking at portion sizes in France versus the U.S.?
The amount of food people eat is largely determined by what is out in front of them or by the size of individual portions of food that are sold in store. Rozin and colleagues compared yogurt containers in the United States and France. Yogurt containers in America are about 80% bigger than they are in France. Individual serving, such as chocolate bars, soft drinks, and lasagna are also larger in America. Even fruit is larger in American than in France.
What were the results of another study by Rozin et al. (1999) on four countries and their attitudes (both of men and women) towards food? Who had the most positive and the most negative attitudes?
French view eating as a more leisurely and enjoyable activity than Americans do. The French tend to spend more time eating their food than Americans do. When the French are eating at McDonald’s, they take 50% langer to eat than Americans do. Despite the fact they are concumingfewer fries, and drinking smaller soft drinks, and eating smaller grilled chicken sandwiches. People are expected to savor their food in France. Americans make more of effort to consume products that appear to have been altered to make them healthier, less salt, fat, or sugar. When asked to list whatever words come to mind when one thinks of the word “food”, one of the top responses American females was “fatting” a word that did not appear on the french list of frequent responses
In terms of cultural variation for sleep, what is a sleep pattern for the U.S. versus some subsistence societies (and for the U.S. before electric lighting)?
In most cultures of the world, children co-sleep with their parents whereas in the West it is more common for children to sleep separately. Before the time of electric lighting, people would go to bed sometime after sunset, wake in the middle of the night for an hour or so and then return to sleep. American adults also find that if people are kept in a room that goes dark for 14 hours each day, they will also revert to a pattern of two sleeps separated by a period of increasing wakefulness in the middle of the night.
What are some differences between Western cultures and East Asian cultures on amount of sleep that both infants and adults seem to get?
Japanese and Korean adults report sleeping about an hour less per day than French adults. A systematic study of infant and toddlers in 17 countries around the world found that Japanese infants sleep 1.5 hours less than North American infants. In general, infants from Asian countries were found to sleep much less than infants from Western countries. Dutch infants slept about 1.3 hours more than American infants.
What is some evidence that the amount of sleep that people get is affected more by local culture than heritage culture?
In a recent study Japanese, European-Canadian, Asian-Canadian university students wear asked to wear a watch for one week at a time that objectively provided biometric measurement of their sleep quality over that time. Japanese university students slept about 1.2 hours less than the two Canadian samples, who did not differ at all. That Asian-canadians slept similarly European -Canadians suggests that sleep is affected more by local cultural norms that by their heritage cultural norms. Despite sleeping less than Canadians, however, Japanese were not any more efficient in their sleep- they did not wake up fewer times over the course of the night, or take less time to fall asleep the Japanese were just getting by on substantially less sleep than Canadians. The Japanese students also indicated that their ideal amount of sleep was also about an hour less than the reported by Canadians. Even though they were sleeping more than Japanese, the Canadians described themselves as feeling more tired during the day.
What makes up socioeconomic status (SES)?
The household income, meaning - income, education, and prestige of occupation.
Why were unskilled laborers more likely to die than any position above them in the England study? How does income predict mortality in the U.S. too?
The unskilled laborers have jobs that place them in hazardous situation, more physically demanding work, vulnerable to workplace accidents. They have a lower income to live on. It cost more to be healthy. They have less access to health care. Live an unhealthy lifestyle such as smoking, eating fast food, or living a sedentary lifestyle, less likely to exercise. This is also true for Americans. People of a lower SES are predicted to not live as long as those with a higher SES.
Why is stress key to understanding the role between SES and health outcomes? How does this relationship relate to control?
Stress and feelings of lack of control tend to be more pronounced among those who occupy a subordinate position and are subject to the demands of those who are able to make decisions for themselves. These people experience a greater level of stress hormones.
How can feeling poor (or relative deprivation) predict health?
Objective SES and Subjective SES. That is, feeling poor can matter as much as actually being poor. The experience of relative deprivation, of knowing that others are doing better than you, might lead to stress and its associated negative health consequences.
Why do many African Americans have poorer health, and how does this go beyond SES? Why do African American men with college degrees have more hypertension than African American men with less education?
The perception of discrimination and education are positively correlated among African-Americans. Which might help explain why hypertension rates are higher among higher-SES African-Americans who most strongly aspire to achieve in the face of discrimination are most at risk for hypertension and other health vulnerabilities. Being a target of racism and discrimination appears to directly related to the average poorer health outcome of African-Americans.
Why are U.S. Latinos less likely to suffer adverse health outcomes as compared to African Americans? What are some of the more logical explanations for the “epidemiological paradox?”
*they have not lived in america every long, the longer they live in America they begin to drink and smoke more and become more over weight.
U.S. Latinos tend to be of a lower SES than African-Americans yet they do not suffer from worse health rise.
What are some of the factors that seem to be predicting poorer health among those with lower SES and in poverty?
- hazardous jobs
- lack of access to health services
- cultural contexts of unhealthy habits
- stress
- experience to racism (acting out stereotypes)
