Obesity and Lifestyle Change - Thinking About Activities

In previous posts we have discussed how people use time, their patterns of activity, and how these relate to their well being. These discussions have focused a great deal on how activities influence mood, or how they can serve to reduce stress. Less has been said about how activity influences our heart, lungs, nervous system, bones and muscles and other physiological systems.

I hasten to point out that this is not a post about exercise and physical fitness. The body is a complex system, with many individual subsystems working together to explain that complexity. Ordinarily, we think of the brain as the control center. But we seldom think of the back office systems that influence how the brain works. One of these back office systems is the endocrine system. This system regulates the chemicals in our bloodstream that carry messages to the nervous system. It influences metabolism, tissue growth, development and mood. Scientific discussions about how stress harms the body focus directly on this system of alerting or message sending through hormones. This brings us to the main topic of this post—obesity

Obesity is a significant health problem and it can be described as a kind of banner or symbolic indicator of how activity and lifestyle in the 21st century can influence health in both beneficial and harmful ways. Obesity is an epidemic, and if you visit the website of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), you will see a dramatic illustration of how the incidence of obesity has spread across the country over the past two decades. The data clearly suggest that obesity is not just a regional phenomenon, nor a socio-economic phenomenon. It is a lifestyle phenomenon that is related to how people spend time to consume and expend energy. If you notice in the CDC chart how the prevalence of obesity has spread, states where there are more outdoor opportunities for hiking, skiing and kayaking, or more farming and ranching— seem to be the last places where the obesity epidemic arrived. That suggests environment (and activity opportunity) influences obesity. But we are getting ahead of ourselves here. There is another important factor related to weight gain—hormones. Especially hormones resulting from living stressful lifestyles.

Without going into too much detail or repeating information available widely on the Internet, most diets (the usual approach to battling weight gain) fail. Why? Because hormones signal our body to store energy (or calories) so that we can survive famine conditions. These systems are ancient, biological survival mechanisms that evolved over millions of years when humans were hunters or gatherers. Animals in the wild have the same systems, but they spend their awake hours in a quest to find food just as humans once did. They may go for days in their quest for meals, burning more calories than they are able to replenish. Contrast this with the modern life of humans in the U.S. and other developed nations: Going for hours without a meal is often viewed as a starvation diet!

Thus, animal species (including humans) are biologically wired to store calories and resist efforts to expend them. All dieters know that as soon as they begin reducing their food intake, their body reacts by increasing its efforts to hold on to those life sustaining calories. That's what makes dieting so difficult. But food intake is only half of the equation.

The other part is energy expenditure. As modern conveniences are developed, technology becomes our enemy. We move less, watch TV or surf the Internet more, and there is little calorie burning to offset our increased consumption. Moreover, eating itself is an activity, and a pleasurable one. Generally, people would rather eat than work out on the treadmill. Eating is also typically a social activity. When people get together to enjoy themselves and each other, food is often involved.The result is increased body weight. Exercise intentions expressed in New Year resolutions are, well— well intended. But habits and routines are hard to break. People need stimulating reasons to live their lives differently. They need to be motivated to move more and eat less.

But the story doesn't end there. Stress (and there is a lot of that around lately!) produces hormones that signal the body to conserve energy. So metabolism (calorie burning) slows as a result of stress too. Some scientists attribute the obesity epidemic as much to increased levels of stress (and the influence of stress hormones on slowing metabolism) as they do to lifestyle patterns that are characterized by sedentary activities and increased food consumption.

So, at long last, we get to the point of this post about obesity. Obesity is more than weight gain. It is a condition of lifestyle that is affected by factors that have nothing to do with eating. The interesting thing is, these factors involve human activities, and the most natural solutions have to do with the activities people do as they live their everyday lives. If those activities help people burn more calories and eat less, so much the better. But if they give pleasure, reduce stress, and stop signaling the body to store energy, they provide a double benefit. The bottom line: Activity is more than exercise!

Use of Leisure Time - Implications for Health and Well Being

The American Time Use Survey, reports from which are featured on the Bureau of Labor Statistics website, reveal some interesting data about how people spend time. Of particular interest here are two activities, television and Internet usage, that consume significant portions of available leisure time. For example, watching TV accounted for half of the leisure time available to men and women (2.62 and 2.88 hours per day on average). As might be expected, young people from 15-19 spend more leisure time on computers than people of other ages. The average for this age group was around 50 minutes per day. In contrast, leisure activity involving sports, exercise or other types of recreation averaged slightly less than 30 minutes per day.

The implications of these statistics for health should be apparent. Sedentary activities may be interesting, but they don't provide the kind of movement necessary for maintaining fitness, including strength, endurance, and proper body mass index (percentage of fat) to avoid risk of obesity, heart disease and other chronic conditions. Movement burns calories, and regular exercise coupled with moderate and appropriate food intake helps to maintain weight within healthy limits.

How people use time, obviously, not only has significant consequences for physical fitness, but it also influences other types of "psychological fitness", such as how interested or bored they are, and how challenged or motivated they may be to participate in activities that lead to skill development, accomplishment, and improvements in self-esteem or self confidence. Research shows that when people are successful in new activities or projects, they are more inclined to undertake additional challenges. These cumulative successes create the sense of meaning that we need to live our lives with energy and purpose .

Unfortunately, time use surveys have not yet begun to gather data on qualitative factors, such as the feelings one might have that are associated with doing a particular activity. Part of those feelings, of course, are based on the context in which an activity is done ( that is, who is with us, what motivated us, what need will be served, etc.); but time use scientists generally feel that the opportunity exists for gathering more qualitative data in such surveys.

As time use science evolves, there will be more objective evidence to provide guidance to people on how to design their lives for optimal health and happiness. This is just another part of the interdisciplinary science of everyday living.

Seratonin and Mood: Evidence that Activity and Happiness are Connected

Serotonin, a hormone, is known to be an important chemical messenger that influences brain activity related to a wide range of functions, emotions and behaviors. These include circadian rhythms, moods, and thought. Disorders related to seratonin have been linked with impulsive violence, anxiety, and depression.

Higher levels of seratonin are associated with feelings of happiness and well-being. Too little seratonin is implicated in depression. But too much seratonin can be toxic and fatal. What is needed, it seems, is efficient regulation, which relates to having the right levels of seratonin and the right number of brain structures to use it appropriately. Current treatment approaches typically involve drugs that attempt to increase or decrease seratonin levels or improve its processing in order to achieve a satisfactory balance and the proper mood.

Because depression is a growing worldwide public health issue, new approaches to understanding this brain-mood-behavior phenomenon is in everyone's interest. That's why a recent editorial by the editor of the Journal of Psychiatry and Neuroscience is of interest here. The editorial, by Simon Young, suggests that new evidence supports the use of non-drug interventions in mood disorders related to seratonin.

Without going into the highly technical specifics of the science here, what Dr. Young suggests is that exposure to light, exercise, diet, and activities that lead to improved mood may all be examples of lifestyle- related strategies that can be used to address seratonin imbalances and prevent depression and its consequences. His article cited several promising studies that provide evidence for his "non drug intervention" proposal. I like this line of thinking, because it shows again that through lifestyle related interventions, people can influence their health and well-being. More emphasis on population-based approaches to preventing or treating health related disorders through lifestyle change must be a part of health care reform. Population based lifestyle intervention is smart, synergistic, humanistic, and economical.

Aligning Believing and Doing - Another Feature of Balanced Lifestyles?

A recent story on the NPR series called "This I Believe" featured an essay by a seven year old (Tarak McClain) of Austin, Texas. Tarak shortened his original list of 100 beliefs into a radio-ready list of 30, which he read on the air.

Aside from the remarkable fact that this very young man was thoughtful and wise enough to compose this list, (and poised enough to do an exemplary job of recording his interview), the notable feature of his story relates to his acting in ways that are consistent with his beliefs. Tarak has a commendable list of service projects to his credit already. This made me think about my recent posts on life balance, and one of the papers given at the life balance symposium I attended. This particular paper was about life balance as acting in accordance with personal values.

Values and beliefs are closely related. But few of us always stop to think (except on Sundays if we are church going Christians, or on other days if we practice other faiths) about how our actions align with what we profess to believe. For example, I believe in sustainability and conserving energy so that future generations will enjoy a high quality of life. But when I think about the actual things I am doing that are in alignment with this belief, I am embarrassed that the list is shorter than I would like. Perhaps this is why the phrase, "talk is cheap", was coined.

Tarak and I share some significant beliefs, and I suspect, that given the way 7 year old young men come to form their beliefs, that his parents have similar sentiments about community, peace, service to others, living in harmony and other values. But in the end, when it comes to making our communities and world better places, when actions and beliefs are aligned, we create the world we imagine. As Gandhi said "We must be the change we hope to see in the world."

I invite you to share your beliefs about living life well on this post, and to comment on the actions that reflect those beliefs.

Life Balance, What is it?

One of the aims of this blogsite is to promote dialogue about aspects of living well, focusing on how human activity, or how people use their time, contributes to their happiness, health and well-being. When it comes to lifestyles, daily routines can be regular, predictable and peaceful, or they can be volatile, unpredictable and stressful. Most of us experience lives that show characteristics of each extreme. Which is better? Should we be striving for steady state, and what would that be like? Is the journey through life best viewed as a highway metaphor where we try to maintain a course in the middle? How do we define that "middle ground"?

An earlier post in this series alluded to balance, pointing out that Michelle Obama, the incoming first lady, sees work-family balance as an important public health and family issue. Because lives out of balance are typically stressful, imbalance can be said to contribute to illness and chronic diseases, as pointed out in the post on resilience.

Most people intuitively understand that regular, predictable, and stress-avoidant routines are related to their well being, and thus they have a personal view of what life balance means, or what type of lifestyle works best for them.

Eighteen months ago, I had the privilege of participating in an international conference in Canada that brought together scientists and other experts from many disciplines for a discussion about life balance from theoretical and scientific perspectives. Although there were many interesting ideas expressed about how to define, study and otherwise understand life balance, another perspective examined during the meeting was philosophical. Is life balance a valid concept, or is it just another name for similar "positive states"? For example, is it the same idea as "well being" or "quality of life" with just another name?

My view is that all three concepts have features in common. However, life balance seems unique because it focuses specifically on how activity is organized within a life to help us achieve the outcomes we desire. I surmise that there is no one "life activity formula" that works for everyone, but that a successful formula must include certain characteristics or reflect identified principles.

What is your idea of a balanced life? What lifestyle characteristics do you think social scientists should consider in studying this concept? I look forward to reading your posts.

Sleep - Another type of healthful activity

It may not seem obvious, but in our daily round of activities, sleep must be counted among the most important. Recent reports have shown that teens in North America are sleep deprived, averaging less than seven hours per sleep per night when they require almost nine hours. Surely, cell phones, computers, online gaming, and television are part of the cause for this; but it would be too simple to say that teens don't sleep because they are absorbed by a more engaging activity.

In normal, healthy people, sleep is regulated or influenced by internal clocks, or circadian rhythms. The most germane of those rhythms that influence sleep is known as the rest-activity cycle. This cycle is influenced by hormones that are triggered by daylight, and a tiny gland in the skull known as the pineal gland has been implicated in explaining this. Humans evolved to be able to sleep during dark and be active during the day. Why? Because evolution works to maximize survival of species. Since humans see poorly in the dark, we are better off sleeping and being active during the daytime.

There is much to learn about sleep and how it serves to keep people healthy and mentally alert. We do know that it is vitally necessary to sleep. Extreme sleep deprivation can lead to death. We also know that normal sleep involves stages, and that the fourth stage, or Rapid Eye Movement (REM) stage of sleep, is thought to be the most important for its restorative properties. REM sleep is that stage of sleep during which we dream. If we don't achieve REM sleep, our sleep is of lesser quality. Normal humans go through several cycles involving all stages of sleep each night. People who sleep and say don't dream are simply not recalling their dreams.

Getting a good night's sleep (full of dreams) involves many factors. The most important factor for good sleep hygiene is having a rest-activity cycle that is entrained, or synchronized with what is happening in the social world. People need regular routines and activities to keep their internal clocks synchronized with the world. Jet lag after long distance air travel is a condition that places our internal clocks at odds with the social world around us when we fly to a new environment. Ordinarily, it can take as long as 30 days for the body to fully recover from jet lag.

Of course, shift workers are also at risk of insomnia caused by disentrainment, since shift workers must be active at night when their body tells them they should be sleeping. Of course, some adjustment does occur, as long as the shifts do not vary frequently. Some countries have laws that regulate shiftwork as a public health safeguard for such workers.

So, let's return to the issue of teens and sleep deprivation. It is likely that at least some of the sleep debt being accumulated by teens has less to do with the effects of more and more distracting late night activity than it does on the effects of such shiftwork on the internal clocks of the teens. It is likely that, like shift workers, teens' internal clocks have changed so that their rest-activity cycles have adjusted, so their body tells them they need to sleep until noon; while their parents and schools are telling them to get up at seven to begin classes or catch the bus! Thus it seems, their sleep deprivation is less about distracting activities, than it is about modified internal clocks.

Fyodor Who? on Activity and Happiness

Those avid readers among us will no doubt be able to quickly note that the title to this post refers to Russian author Fyodor Dostoyevski. Dostoyevski is among the most famous authors in history, and lived from 1821-1881. During his sixty year lifespan he wrote two fiction classics that are included on most great books lists, including The Brothers Karamozov and Crime and Punishment. In addition to being a great writer, Dostoyevski is sometimes credited as being one of the originators of the philosophy of existentialism.

So what does Dostoyevski have to do with this blogsite? Well, because doing is so important to our happiness and well being, those who love to read (and read and read) will certainly enjoy the works of Dostoyevski. But he appears in this blog not for that reason, but because he wrote an interesting passage about activity and happiness in a book of occasional writings. The excerpt is as follows:

"Our passion for some sort of activity reaches a point of feverish and uncontrollable impatience; we all long for some serious occupation, many of us are full of an ardent desire to do good, to be of some use, and we gradually begin to realize that happiness is not the same thing as being able to afford to sit about twiddling one's thumbs or just to do something for the sake of a change when the occasion arises, but consists of continual and tireless activity and the development of all faculties and capabilities in practice."

This observation by Dostoyevski is blogworthy here because it makes some interesting observations about activity and happiness. Reading along and between the lines, one might claim the following existential interpretation:

We serve our well-being best when we make choices about what we do that are consistent with our values and sense of self, and when those activities help us grow and become more competent. Indeed, it might be said that we create ourselves (our identities) through doing activities that are genuine, that allow us to express the joy of being and our uniqueness through creating or producing something that expresses some purpose or has meaning. Dan McAdams, whose studies of people's stories has been mentioned in other blogs and whose work is listed on this blogsite, coined the expression "selfing" to refer to this type of activity that serves self expression and beingness.

Think about what you do, and how many of those activities are done because of others, and how many were initiated with careful thought by you, the doer, to challenge and engage yourself, to help you realize your unique potential, and to truly make you feel "alive". Those kinds of activity choices are among the most important decisions we make.

What are you doing among your regular activities currently that makes you feel authentic? That may be a hard question to answer, but if you care to give it a try, please share it with others on this blogsite. And if you've a mind to, visit the wdydwyd? website to get a taste of how others express their authenticity.

As always, if you have a different perspective or a comment to add about anything written here, by all means, do it! Please share it here and now.