Int’l #Facepalm Day: APA Sez Overweight Kids = ‘Too Much Gaming’ (AGAIN)

 

This won’t end well.

The American Pediatrics Association has just decided (again!) that that children’s total entertainment “screen media time” should not exceed two hours daily: television and video games.  According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, average kids watch at least twice that much television.

The Family Foundation alleges that these activities, collectively called “screen time,” are “widely blamed for the tripling of obesity rates in children since the 1980s.”

“Sitting” anywhere for an extended amount of time of course, isn’t good for building muscle or for honing a killer bod – but get this: no researcher anywhere has been able to find a direct casual link between video games and being OVERWEIGHT. Well, well…

In February, researchers in Texas reported their findings on whether it would help kids lose weight to have their regular video games replaced with a more active alternative such as the Nintendo Wii console. In their study, 84 children received Wii consoles and one half of those got a collection of exercise-oriented games like Wii Sports and EA Active, which ask players to move their arms and legs or jump around to control the action. The other half of the kids got “inactive” games like Madden NFL, which can be played from a seated position with minimal full-body movements. The results of the comparison were disappointing. After three months, “there was no evidence that children receiving the active video games were more active in general or at any time,” the authors wrote.

Some folks over in New Zealand did a study last year and found that limiting screen time only contributed to an average one pound weight loss in young subjects.

My feelings are that one, I hate passing the blame in anyway, shape or form — and that two, researchers need to consider the elements in their entirety here: television ‘screen time’ is very VERY different than video game ‘screen time.’

For instance, a decade ago, a physiologist named Arlette Perry at the University of Miami worried that her 10-year-old son Thomas was spending way too much time with a video game controller in his hand. To measure the effects of chronic gaming, she studied her son and 20 other children as they played Tekken 3 on a Sony PlayStation in her lab. She found that the fighting game increased the kids’ heart rates and blood pressure to the same extent as walking at 3 miles per hour. 

Surprised? I’m not. I play Warcraft. I’ve been in a random dungeon with a n00b psycho tank plenty of times. Aggro two mobs while the healer is bio/lag/decided to log? Instant heart attack. #Facepalm #Leroy

The U of Mia study also found that children burned roughly twice as many calories playing Tekken 3 as they did sitting in one place, which translates to an extra 40 to 80 calories burned every hour. Veddy intedestink...

NOTE: They ain’t talking bout you, ‘Second Lifers.’

WTH. The reason so many youngsters – let’s dissect gamers here – experience weight issues is because of the extremely poor nutrition habits that usually goes along with the ‘gaming’ lifestyle. I’m talking the food usually breaks down to mealtime, crapfest, mealtime, crapfest, mealtime, late-night crapfest. All the snacking combined with bizarro late hours (Hey, my guild is in New Zealand) – and a relative complacency with their inactivity level will lead to health issues – of course. That has nothing to do with playing the game itself.

There is indeed a well-known correlation between obesity and hours spent in front of a video screen, but the fact of that linkage doesn’t tell us anything about causality.

Not saying you should focus on playing videos games if you are getting ready for a figure show or anything BUT  –

Want to know the real reason a kid will gain weight right in front of your eyes??? HINT: It’s not video games, it isn’t television and it isn’t because the next door neighbor’s cat is cross-eyed. It’s because they are eating too much – there is too much access to garbage-y food in the household, at school, at their friend’s homes, etc etc. Couple that with a total lack of food and nutrition know how/who/what and what’s a kid to do?

Limit the garbage that is available to snack on in the house – and educate your kid on proper nutrition and maybe they’ll be more likely to beat the battle of the bulge and their opponent online.

i.e “PARENT” YOUR KIDS…teach them balance. Hopefully, they’ll make better decisions when they aren’t home. If they know and more importantly understand, they will be less likely to choose the Ring Dings in the cafeteria.

-AM

P.S. Show them CARDIO WORLD – it’s ‘kid and adult-friendly’

[youtube]http://youtu.be/GeH-DM6LFQ4[/youtube]

Source Love: Slate

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