Why Do People Eat Fast Food?

Food that is supplied quickly after placing an order with minimal service is often referred to as fast-food.

Although fast food is widely criticized for its high calorie content and perceived poor quality, it is eaten by millions of people every year.The reasons behind the popularity of fast food range from convenience through to brand familiarity. Whilst there are certainly negative consequences of eating certain types of fast food, there is nothing to say that the concept of fast food in itself is necessarily bad.

The reasons people eat fast food
Love it or loathe it, fast food is certainly very popular. The fast food industry is thought to be worth a staggering $1.5 billion in the US alone.

Based on this, there must be something fundamentally appealing about fast food that makes it so popular. In my opinion, the main reasons people eat fast food are:

·         Economically priced food
·         Speed and efficiency of service
·         Brand familiarity
·         Representative of popular cuisine


The fast food economy 
One of the main reasons people flock to fast food restaurants is because they are often seen as an economic and hassle-free way to enjoy a meal.

The way fast food chains keep their prices relatively low is by producing their food on a large scale. This reduces the cost of purchasing and preparing the food, and means that they can afford to charge relatively-low prices whilst still maintaining a significant profit margin.

There is a lot of criticism out there aimed at the way the fast food industry is run. One particular target of contempt is the wage structure of many fast food companies- where executives and owners of companies earn huge sums, whilst many of their employees work for a minimum hourly rate.

Speed of fast food
By mass-producing a relatively small menu, fast food restaurants are able to provide warm meals very quickly without encountering a significant loss through wastage. The idea of being able to order at a counter, receive your meal within seconds, and not have to worry about waiting to be seated, served or asking for a cheque means that fast food restaurants are often the first choice for many diners who are in a rush.

Fast food brands
The branding of fast food chains is a major factor in their success. Imagine being out on the road, or wondering about an unfamiliar town or country. If you're looking for somewhere to eat, you may want to play it safe and stick to what you know.

Fast food companies have built an industry of making sure they are 'what we know' through aggressive advertising and marketing strategies. Essentially, knowing what you're going to get from a fast food brand means you are more likely to pick them over a competitor you don't know anything about.

From a customers point of view, it is useful to know that you can count on a fast food restaurant to provide certain things. Advantages that familiarity of a fast food restaurant includes:

·         Familiarity with the menu
·         Child-friendly environment
·         Ability to easily estimate the cost of a meal through knowledge of their pricing

Junk Food vs. Healthy Nutrition For Children

For many parents, helping children develop healthy eating habits is a struggle. With the hectic pace of many families' lives and with more women working full time, even health-conscious parents are finding it easy to tolerate less than desirable eating habits.

"A lot of parents don't want to struggle with the issues so they give up, letting kids make their own choices," says Jane Rees, director of nutrition service/education in adolescent medicine and lecturer in pediatrics at the University of Washington schools of Medicine and Public Health. "But children's judgment is less mature and they still depend on parents to guide them."

It is best to start training children about foods as soon as they can talk since they are most influenced by their families during the preschool years. Additionally, research has shown that heart and blood vessel disease can begin very early and that hardening of the arteries (arteriosclerosis or atherosclerosis) can be associated with a high-fat diet.

Parents should carefully read food labels to check nutrients and ingredients. Most kids are attracted to the advertising and packaging of food, including highly sugared cereals. Rees suggests fitting them in occasionally as a treat in an overall diet that is focused on low sugar, low fat, and unprocessed foods.

Although it's a myth that children become hyperactive by eating too much sugar, sugary food is still bad for oral health, can be stored as fat, and aggravates diabetes, says Rees. However, completely denying children sugar will only make it more tempting.

Rees suggests involving young children in the food preparation process. For example, teach children how to set the table during their preschool years. Take them grocery shopping. Let them choose some fruits and vegetables as well as the occasional treats, advises Rees. "You will see their capabilities grow astronomically," she says. "However, if parents don't follow the natural signs that kids are ready to help, they will lose the window of opportunity."

Developing children's attitude toward food should be similar to teaching them how to handle money -- by giving them growing responsibility along with sensible access. If children are properly prepared, they are more likely to make healthy food choices once they enter school. They will probably experiment some, but they will have a preference for fresh foods like fruits and vegetables along with foods like french fries, says Rees.

What about changing the diet of children who have already fallen into the junk food habit? Once children reach age 10 or 12, it is very difficult to change their habits or coerce them into eating healthier foods. Rees suggests calling a family meeting to rationally discuss ways to eliminate most junk foods and substitute more nutritious ones. If they learn to eat a well-balanced diet, they won't need vitamin supplements, she says.

"Nutritional guidance won't work unless you have built up good sense (of nutrition) over time," says Rees. "However, even children who have developed a taste for nutritious food may change when they reach teenage years. Teenagers like to experiment with everything, including risky food behavior. They might gravitate toward highly processed foods, but once they become older and more independent they are likely to return to the healthy habits they had growing up."

Other common problems among teenagers include girls who may view food as a threat to slimness, or boys who take muscle-building supplements. About 25 to 40% of teenagers are overweight, mostly from lack of exercise in combination with eating too much fat and sugar. This problem can turn into an emotional one and become a vicious circle -- eating, or starving, to cope with unhappiness.

"If you see a real eating problem and there is anger and conflict," advises Rees, "seek professional intervention." Helpful support of family, friends and healthcare professionals is the best method for addressing eating disorders.

Eating Junk Food

What is the problem about?

Foods that contain more oils or sugar or are fried or roasted with little or almost no nutritional value are considered junk foods. They lack in proteins, vitamins and fiber. For many parents, helping children develop healthy eating habits is a struggle. Because of their enhanced flavour, children are tempted to eat more of them to the extent of avoiding homemade food. Consumption of junk food has been associated with obesity, heart disease, diabetes and dental cavities in children. Children habitual of eating junk food tend to avoid healthy staple foods like chapattis, rice, dal, vegetables and fruits and miss on essential nutrients required for growth and development.

Signs/symptoms to look for

Children more attracted towards junk food from the market. They avoid healthy homemade food. They avoid fruits and vegetables. They argue quite often that home-cooked food has no taste.

Causes

If you set aside all the negative aspects, junk food contains lots of flavours to tickle the taste buds of children and grown-ups alike. Hence, the root cause of children opting for junk food is the use of this kind of food by the parents themselves. Working mothers find junk food an easy way to silence intermittent bouts of hunger of their children. This saves them from the trouble of cooking the food themselves. Another reason for children yearning for junk food is excessive pampering by the parents and always allowing them to have their way in consuming junk food. Television ads depicting junk food in a delicious and tantalising form also act as boosters for increasing appetite for junk food. Sometimes eating out junk food in a particular restaurant or eatery gives children a false pride among friends.

Solutions

This is more of a habitual problem. Usually it can be eliminated by changing some of your and your children’s habits. However, in worse cases, wisdom from Ayurveda can successfully be applied to minimise eating junk food. It is best to start training children about foods as soon as they can talk since they are most influenced by their family during the preschool years. If children are properly prepared, they are more likely to make healthy food choices once they enter school. They will probably experiment with some junk food, but they will have a preference for fresh foods like fruits and vegetables along with burgers and French fries. Take the trouble of cooking regularly at home and serve home-made food in an attractive way. Try to minimise the intake of junk food yourself as well.

Children and Junk Food

Children find themselves amidst a complex society that is undergoing breathtaking changes. Concepts, relationships, lifestyles are metamorphisised to accommodate the new jet-setting age. Food is no exception. Healthy nutritious foods have been replaced by the new food mantra - JUNK FOOD! Junk food comprises of anything that is quick, tasty, convenient and fashionable. It seems to have engulfed every age; every race and the newest entrants are children. Wafers, colas, pizzas and burgers are suddenly the most important thing. The commonest scenario is a child who returns from school and plonks himself in front of the television, faithfully accompanied by a bowl of wafers and a can of cola. Children suddenly seem to have stepped into a world of fast foods and vending machines, totally unaware of the havoc they are creating for themselves. 

The years between 6-12 are a time of steady growth; good nutrition is a high priority. Children must know that what they eat affects how they grow, feel and behave. Changes in our society have intensified the need for food skills, to the extent that they need to become a part of the child's basic education for good health and survival. The vast majority of working mothers with school age children are laboured with exhausting commutes, upswings in the households, and stress, leading to a situation where parents get to spend limited time with their children. Traditional food skills are not passed on automatically from parent to child. Most people have forgotten that the primary reason for eating is nourishment. In the not so distant past, food was treated with reverence because of its life sustaining quality. Enjoying a meal was sharing experience with the others. Today family dinners are rare. In many ways, our culture is structured to foster poor eating habits. Television commercials and supermarkets are propagating a wide variety of enticing junk foods, attractively packaged and often tagged with a tempting sop. We should be constructing an environment that protects our children. Instead we have a highly seductive environment that undermines eating habits. 

For children who have less vision of the heart disease, cancer, high blood pressure or diabetes that might befall them decades later, the tentacles of a junk food environment are virtually inescapable.  Studies reveal that as early as the age of 30, arteries could beginning clogging and lay the groundwork for future heart attacks. What children eat from puberty affects their risks of prostate and breast cancer.  Osteoporosis and hypertension are other diseases that appear to have their earliest roots in childhood when lifelong eating habits are being formed. Children are especially vulnerable. Poor diets can slow growth, decay new teeth, promote obesity and sow the seeds of infirmity and debilitating disease that ultimately lead to incurable disease and death or worse make life insufferable. 

Most of the times these junk foods contain colors that are laced with colors, those are often inedible, carcinogenic and harmful to the body. These foods and their colors can affect digestive systems, the effects of it emerging after many years. Studies have found that food coloring can cause hyperactivity and lapses of concentration in children. Children suffering from Learning Disabilities are often advised against eating food with artificial coloring. Chocolates, colas, flavored drinks and snack tit bits are full of artificial coloring. 

Not surprisingly, junk food not only has physiological repercussions, but also psychological ones - far reaching ones that affect the child's intellect and personalities. Coping intelligently with their dietary needs increases their self-esteem, and encourages further discovery. School days are full of educational challenges that require long attention spans and stamina. Poor nutritional habits can undermine these pre-requisites of learning, as well as sap the strength that children need for making friends, interacting with family, participating in sports and games or simply feeling god about themselves. 

Junk foods are often eaten in instead of regular food, an essential Indian diet that consists of wholesome chapatis and vegetables or snacks like upmas and idlis. Not surprisingly eating junk food leads to a sense of starvation both physically and mentally, as the feeling of satiation and contentment that comes after a wholesome meal is absent. There is simply no substitute for the feeling that descends, when you wake up and find that you are ready to take on the world and this primarily stems from GOOD HEALTH! There is no better time than now to build a supportive environment for nurturing our children and endowing them with a legacy of good health.

Harmful effects of junk food

Junk food is the name given to the food that maintains a low in nutrition and a high in the amounts of harmful ingredients. Most of us are aware of the ill effects of the junk food yet; fail to get over the habit of consuming junk food. It is the number of calories and the huge amounts of detrimental substances present in the junk food that are responsible for the increase of the high triglyceride levels.

 Some junk food facts

The nutrients like vitamins and minerals are too less in junk food while the amount of calories are more. The enormous amount of oxychlolesterol, in these high cholesterol foods encourages the levels of high triglycerides and hence in the level of bad fats. The artificial flavors added for the children also play their part in having a negative effect on the health which has a sugar content that is twice the amount of those added in that of the adult food. There are copious levels of sugar in the junk food which sooner or later it may take a huge toll on your health.
A single soda for instance contains about ten teaspoons of sugar that may instantly raise the amount of calories in the body. Apart from colas, the cookies, desserts and chocolates have also been acknowledged as having huge amounts of sugar. The presence of hydrogenated oils and the trans fats present in the junk food such as candy bars, cookies and fried foods make the junk food all the more threatening. The salts that are added to augment the piquancy of the food are also equally harmful.

Unhelpful Effects of Junk Food

Obesity is the most common effect of regular consumption of junk food. This effect takes place pretty fast in children as the junk food meant for them has more calories. The sugars in the colas and sodas and the hydrogenated oils in fried foods are highly responsible for the fat amassment therefore in high triglyceride levels in the body. This in turn leads to the congestion in the arteries making it difficult for the free flow of blood through them, eventually leading to conditions like heart attack.
A high blood pressure is the subsequently possible baleful upshot of relishing the junk food. This effect can be attributed to the presence of the sodium that is added to the food.
The outcome of obesity caused by excessive consumption of junk food is lethargy which lulls the body and makes you lead a sedentary lifestyle thus bringing in the possibility of other harmful effects for health.
It is also credible that you can develop a liver failure as the result of the obesity-causing cholesterol and diabetes-causing sugars.

What are the negative effects of Junk Food?

Junk food causes major hazards on a person’s health because of its less nutritional values. Junk food contains a lot of calories and unhealthy saturated fats that may lead to obesity, diabetics, and high B.P. In spite of being aware of its hazards, people get addicted to the junk food. Foods like pizzas, burgers, hydrogenated vegetable oil, and saturated fats are high on the taste quotient. Soft drinks like, Pepsi, sprite, fanta, lemonade and others contain high amount of sugar and color.

What is Junk Food ?

Have you questioned yourself on the bad effects of junk food? Junk food…the most lovable food of Westerners and Indians too. It causes major health impact on them. The ingredients used in the processing of the junk food make them very tasty and popular. An online survey on junk food says that, fast food industry is growing rapidly in china as compared to US. It also reveals that 15% of Chinese children aged 10-12 are suffering from obesity as a result of consuming fast food.

Junk food chart

The great example of Indian Junk food is ‘Chaat’ like samosas, kachoris, Panipuris/golappas and others. Junk food affects the body in a negative way because it contains high sugar, fat, cholesterol and fatty oils. Junk food causes pimples in youth and teenagers due to excess oil used in making of junk food. Most of the people love to eat while watching TV and at work locations. Without their notice they eat a lot which damages their body in a great way.