Several days ago we simulated the old fashioned speed dating technique, except this time we weren't trying to find our "soul mates"- we were trying to pick our topic with the input from our speed dates. I thought this gave me a very good idea of which topic I want to further my research on. I've decided to focus on misconceptions of eating disorders, but why? Why would eating disorders and the way they are viewed in society be important to me and my peers? Well, I want to make sure that people who have eating disorders get the help they need rather than being shunned for their uncontrollable psychological disorder and my peers agreed with that idea. Yes, everyone had something nice to say about fast food advertising aimed towards kids, but many deemed that as too mainstream because child obesity was a hot topic that has burned out. In addition, my topic of correlating stress and your wellness seemed elementary to most of my peers. However, the misconceptions of eating disorders fascinated many of my peers making them ask me many question and giving me great input, such as giving me the idea of surveying kids around the school, to see what they think and why they think people get eating disorders, to build on my research. In fact, Hannah Conway gave me a great idea to branch off of my original idea. Her idea was to try and focus on the genetic aspect of eating disorders as well, which will thus prove that society does indeed misconceive the "uncontrollable disorder" part of eating disorders. I really appreciated the idea because it broadened my research as well as strengthened it which will affect my ultimate project very positively. But, my peers did not only give me a hand with improving my research topic, but I also gave them advice and guidance. Mostly everyone had one topic they had in mind, so to help them improve or narrow the focus of their one topic, I helped my classmates with being more specific and lent them ideas of how to gather more specific research to really strengthen their topic research and ultimate project, which I believe they appreciated as much as I appreciated their input.
Society is under the impression that eating disorders are a result of wanting to be thin, perfectionism, or anxiety about food, but eating disorders are actually much more serious than that. Eating disorders are rather ways of coping with depression, anxiety, stress, and other very overwhelming emotions. People often claim that girls or boys with eating disorders are trying to get attention because they have no self-esteem or that they just want to be thin, therefore eating disorders are "choices" that people make, which make those people that "choose" them "weak" or "needy." What these people, that make of most of society, don't know is that eating disorders are not choices or flaws in a person. People who have been besieged by eating disorders often don't realize they have a disorder because the disorder controls every aspect of their life. I followed a blog online for several weeks about a girl recovering from an eating disorder and she explained what it was like and she described her disease as a voice in her head and she also described the kind of treatment she's gotten from people about her disorder, such as people saying she was just seeking attention, but she claims that anorexia was how she coped with her parents' divorce. Since I've read that blog, I've understood more about what eating disorders truly are, which most people don't understand. I think that people with eating disorders need more support from society, but instead they are shunned due to society's misconception of eating disorders, so this blog may be a good place to raise that awareness and help those who don't understand, to understand and help them help those in their life that may be suffering from eating disorders.
I'm not one to watch a lot of tv, but whenever I do, I always see McDonalds commercials that are aimed for children. For example, the rush zone commercial showing the kids watching football and dancing around because they have a happy meal from McDonalds. Now, I understand that childrens' eating habits and obesity is somewhat a responsibility of the parents', but aren't the fast food advertisements, as well? Well, of course they are. They're specifically aimed for children, so it must be working to "brainwash" young children to eat more fast food because it'll make them happier. I'm a person who is passionate about eating and living healthily, so seeing things like this concerns me quite a bit. One of my worst fears is that my own child will have to grow up in an unhealthy world, so this blog would be a great place to express those fears and a possible way to try and reverse the "junk food overload" in American youth. I want my children to grow up with healthy food habits and exercise habits, not with junk food, fast food, and lazy habits, so this topic, due to my strong defense against fast food advertising to small children, could be a great topic for my site for my capstone class.
A topic that I've found interest in to be a topic of my site is stress and how it relates to sickness such as colds, flu, etc. This topic is actually quite ironic because I'm sniffling and coughing while writing this blog. Not only is it just the fact that I'm sick that this topic interests me, but I'm also a very stressed person, so my question is, "Well, does stress affect how susceptible people are to sickness?" To answer my question, I did some reasearch and I found several sites that said "Indeed stress levels correlate with contracting a sickness." However, my favorite site was About Health.com because it not only explains the reasons why one may get sick due to stress, but they also list ways to prevent stress and they give several stress relievers. Stress causes peoples' immune systems to become weakened because it raises cortisol levels and if its chronic stress than diabetes and heart disease risks will raise as well. Also, being stressed out makes for unhealthy choices, such as unhealthy eating habits or no exercise habits. The ways to prevent such results from stress, given by the site, are practice stress preventative techniques such as yoga, make friends and relationships, exercise and eat healthily, and stay organized. However, this site only glazes over the topic of stress and its results, but looking into stress and its correlation with wellness more, I pay have a possible topic for my blog.
Welcome to my blog! I'm a Rutland High School senior and I've built this blog as part of a STEM Capstone class. The blog will help me, as well as other students, to learn the skills of presentation as well as how to become active members of society that are aware what is going on, in reference to current events. Thanks for taking time to check it out! Enjoy!
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