Fat minded?

David Rock asks, “Are our minds going the way of our waists?” In the article, Rock makes an interesting comparison between our habits of eating and consuming social media—specially about how the infrastructure of our food distribution system is similar to that of sites like Facebook: each were designed, claims Rock, to exploit our  “terribly weak circuitry for inhibiting impulses.” The opening two sentences  instantly hooked me:

“The average waistline of people in the developed world has increased 400% in 25 years, with three-quarters of adults now overweight or obese. For the first time in history, there are literally more people overweight than there are starving.”

Rock goes on to identify the “empty neural calories” of constant status updates,  discusses the tendencies and effects of aggressive social seeking, and shares research about the limitations of our brains’ self-regulation capabilities.

Definitely worth the read—and maybe even a status update.