|
tower, walk over to the outhouse, and relieve himself. He would then climb up the tower and resume his observations.
After some days of this, it occurred to these men that as long as they were observant and reported in regularly by radio to headquarters, they could just about do as they pleased, since no one was watching them. So these men would become unkempt. Their quarters would become disarrayed. Clothes were washed when they became unbearable. Dishes were washed only when they were all dirty. They became mountain men. And they urinated right off the top of the tower - downwind, of course.
But if they were to be visited, a return to the norms of society returned quickly. The point is, we do a lot of things because of social pressure: people are watching. We all desperately want to be accepted as normal, worthwhile people. We are afraid of rejection by others, which might occur if we do not conform. Therefore, most of us conform. How does this apply to the plight of the obese? This is the Great Weight Loss Paradox. It goes something like this:
Overweight people feel social pressure to be thin.
They feel discriminated against and ostracized.
This can lead to social isolation and private eating behavior, as well as depression with low self-esteem, leading to reduced self-control.
Isolation and privacy serve to make the problem worse.
Perceived social pressure to be thin is thus both the motivation for weight loss as well as an impediment to the self-control needed to achieve it.
The answer to controlling eating and exercise behaviors may lie in employing a different kind of social scrutiny. Since perceived social scrutiny from the general public can be a negative and destructive force, there is a need for the overweight to get social scrutiny from a new source. That new source is understanding doctors, who can offer positive social support and direction for change.
To return to the forest observer analogy, if someone were watching him,
|
|
