In their book, Obesity in Childhood and Adolescence,  H. Dele Davies, Hiram E. Fitzgerald, and Vasiliki Mousouli discuss some of the causes of childhood obesity.  They propose that environmental and genetic factors play a large role in the issue of childhood obesity. They discuss how the increase of portion size over the last 40 years has led portions to be of an excessive size that now need to be reduced.  The consequence of these larger portion sizes is that they are leading to a higher caloric intake.  In order to support their claims the authors provide significant data from a variety of sources.

Working Thesis

Childhood obesity has many causes such as lack of proper nutrition in the home and school settings, lack of exercise, and poor nutritional models being set by the parents. All of these causes have a negative impact on the mental and physical health of children.

Childhood Obesity

The problem that I will be discussing in my paper is the issue of childhood obesity and the negative impacts it has on a child’s physical and mental health.  While childhood obesity can be found around the world it is most prevalent within our own country, the United States of America.  There are many causes more this issue.  Some of these causes are lack of proper nutrition at home and in schools, lack of exercise at school and at home, poor nutrition model set by the parents and a lack of portion control.  While growing up children consumes most of their meals in the academic setting, cafeterias across the country are not currently providing enough nutritious foods.   Even though there are nutritious foods available there are still a plethora of fatty foods available.  Currently the nutritious options are available but they are not mandatory, as they should be.  There is also a lack of exercise found in today’s youth.  This generation is the generation of the television and videogames.  Recess is a crucial part of a child’s day and is being removed or shortened at many schools across the country, in order to try and keep the child in the classroom and provide them with more hours in the day that are used solely for exercising.  I also believe that gym classes should be mandatory all the way through the education system.  My high school offered the option of being excused from gym by taking a health class.  While I am capable of seeing the merits that a health class has to offer, I think that our overweight society would benefit far more from a mandatory gym class.  As a country, the United States is home to millions of obese adults, many of these adults have children.  These obese parents are setting a negative example for their children, simply giving them the false idea that it is socially acceptable, and healthy to live an overweight life.   Our society is filled with obese people and it has skewed our perception as to what is simply overweight and what is considered obese.  Our skewed vision leads us to view people who are medically deemed obese as simply overweight.  There is also a lack of portion control within a child’s meal.  The human stomach is roughly the size of two human fists.  This means that humans should not be consuming entire plates of food that are comparable to the size of the human head.  This is a problem within schools as well as within the homes of America.  There are many people currently working on coming up with a solution for childhood obesity.  Due to the prevalence and extreme cases found within our country it is very difficult to come up with a plausible solution to the problem.   If this problem is not solved society will continue to produce overweight and obese children who will grow up to be overweight and obese adults.  Overweight and obese people are found to lead far less healthy and far more unhappy lives than those who are of a healthy weight.

The article "Childhood obesity: public-health crisis, common sense cure," written by Cara B Ebbeling, PhD, Dorata B Pawlak, PhD, and Dr. David S Ludwig, MD, discusses prevalence of childhood obesity and the potential causes of childhood obesity.  They attribute many of the causes of childhood obesity to environmental factors.  They also discuss the many negative effects that childhood obesity has on the child's life.  In order to present their argument the authors use a wide variety of information that covers and supports all of their claims. The authors also bring up several possible solutions in order to help eliminate the problem of childhood obesity.  The authors present their information in a very clear and concise manner.

Chapter 13 Precis

 In chapter 13 Lester Faigley and Jack Selzer  discuss proposal arguments.  They use the example of "Don't Drink and Drive" to reinforce their point.  In order to form a proposal argument it is necessary to identify a problem and offer a solution. In order for this to be effective you have to identify the problem, show who it affects, and offer a solution to fix the problem. They lay out the method of creating a proposal argument in a way that is very simple to understand.

7 Resources

1. The report entitled "Fish Consumption and Depression: the Northern Finland 1966 Birth Cohort Study" by Markku Timonen, David Harrobin, Jari Jakelainen, Jaana Laitinin, Anne Herva, and Pirrko Rasanen, covers how the regular consumption of fish throughout a person's life can decrease a risk of depression and suicidality. The authors use a wide variety of sources and data to help prove their point, they even present a chart that shows the difference in the frequency of depression and suicidality between men and women as well as frequent fish consumers and non frequent fish consumers.

Timonen, Markku, David Horrobin, Jari Jokelainen, Jaana Laitinen, Anne Herva, and Pirkko Räsänen. "Fish consumption and depression: the Northern Finland 1966 birth cohort study." Journal of Affective Disorders. 82.3 (2004): 447-452. Web. 16 Feb. 2012.


2. "Early vitamin E supplementation in young but not aged mice reduces Aß levels and amyloid deposition in a transgenic model of Alzheimer’s disease"  is an article, written by Syuan Sung, Yuemang Yao, Kunihiro Uryu, Hengxuan Yang, Virginia M-Y Lee, John Q Trojanowski, Domenico Pratico, that explains the importance of introducing vitamin E into the diet at an early age.  The lab tests done by the researchers demonstrates that if vitamin E is introduced early it can slow the decline of neuro oxidation in Alzheimer patients.  In order to show this to the reader the authors include their graphs and full disclosure of the information they found while conducting research.

Sung, Syuan, Yueman Yao, Kunihiro Uryu, Hengxuan Yang, Virginia M-Y Lee, John Q Trojanowski, and Domenico Pratico. "Early vitamin E supplementation in young but not aged mice reduces Aß levels and amyloid deposition in a transgenic model of Alzheimer’s disease." FASEB Journal. 18.2 (2003): 323-325. Web. 16 Feb. 2012.

3. The article "Food Insufficiency and American School Aged Children's Cognitive, Academic and Psychosocial development" by Katherine Alaimo, PhD, Christine M. Olson PhD, RD, and Edward A. Frongillo Jr, PhD investigates the correlation between insufficient amounts of food and cognitive, academic and psychosocial development in school aged children.  Children were classified as having an insufficient amount of food if the family respondent said that their family often times did not get enough to eat.  In order to conduct their research they used a reduction analysis process to determine the relationship between food insufficiency and cognitive, academic and psychosocial development.

Alaimo, PhD, Katherine, Christine M. Olson PhD, RD, and Edward A. Frongillo Jr, PhD. "Food Insufficiency and American School-Aged Children's Cognitive, Academic, and Psychosocial Development." Online Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics. 108.1 (2001): 44-53. Web. 16 Feb. 2012.
4. Within the article "Nutrition and Depression: Implications for Improving Mental Health Among Childbearing-Aged Women" the authors, Lisa M. Bodnar and Katherine L. Wisner, discuss the importance of good nutritional habits while pregnant.  They explain the ways in which certain fatty acids are essential and the susceptibility of pregnant and lactating women to various vitamins and minerals. In order to prove their thesis the authors use a variety of examples and sources to support their ideas.


Bodnar, Lisa M., and Katherine L. Wisner. "Nutrition and Depression: Implications for Improving Mental Health Among Childbearing-Aged Women." Biological Psychiatry. 58.9 (2005): 679-685. Web. 16 Feb. 2012.

5. The article entitled "Fish Consumption and Major Depression" written by Joseph R Hibbeln discusses his test of the hypothesis that a higher consumption of fish will lead to a lower rate of depression. This was accomplished by collecting data from various countries around the world and comparing the amount of fish consumed within these countries with the amount of depression prevalent within the country. In order to accomplish this feat Joseph R. Hibbeln presents a variety of information and cites many sources within his article.

Hibbeln, Joseph R. "Fish Consumption and Major Depression." Lancet. 351.9110 (1998): 1213. Web. 16 Feb. 2012.

6. Michael Grundman's article "Vitamin E and Alzheimer disease: the Basis for Additional Clinical Trials" discusses the impact of Vitamin E on the oxidation damage induced by ß-amyloid in cell culture and delays memory deficits in animal models.  He makes his case by using multiple test groups and using a placebo in one group and vitamin E in the other and then monitoring the results. He performed these tests in order to determine if vitamin E would be able to prevent or delay a clinical diagnosis of Alzheimer disease.

Grundman, Michael. "Vitamin E and Alzheimer disease: the basis for additional clinical trials." American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. 71.2 (2000): 630-636. Web. 16 Feb. 2012.

7.  The article "Macronutrients and Mental Performance" by Louise Dye, PhD, Anne Lluch, PhD and John E. Blundell, PhD discusses how the impact of macronutrients on mental performance has become a hot topic in the world of science and nutrition.  The authors discuss how glucose has a beneficial effect on cognitive performance. In order to present their hypothesis in a positive manner the authors discuss the flaws that are contained within similar studies that reside within the same field.

Dye, PhD, Louise, Anne Lluch, PhD, and John E. Blundell, PhD. "Macronutrients and MentalPerformance." Nutrition. 16.10 (2000): 1021-1034. Web. 16 Feb. 2012. 

Working Thesis

Eating healthy and nutritiously has a positive impact on mental health because vitamins A, E, B6, B12 and C have the abilitity to reduce oxidative stress in the brain and improve memory function, as well as the fact that food deprivation can affect cognition, and an decrease in fatty acids, such as those found in fish, can lead to depression.