Oh My! Business Professors Discover the Internet Is Fattening

It turns out that obesity researchers may be wasting their time. Business professors have discovered a simple explanation for the rise of obesity. High speed internet is fattening. Pouring over the physiology of obesity and data on potential contributors to its prevalence may be unnecessary.

A new economic analysis by Lin, Churchill, and Ackermann constructs a steadfast bridge from an association to a relationship of cause and effect:

“We find that access to high-speed internet has a positive effect on obesity. Specifically, our preferred instrumental variable estimates, which predict the variation in timing and location of internet access upgrades, suggest that a 1% increase in the proportion of a postcode that has access to the National Broadband Network is associated with a 1.573 increase in Body Mass Index and a 6.6 percentage point increase in the probability of being obese.”

It seems so obvious.

Simple Solutions

Buttressing their bridge, they bring solid logic to support their robust conclusions:

“Sedentary behaviour is induced by the need to stay connected online for longer hours, which leads to lower metabolic rate and contributes to obesity. This problem is compounded by the need to frequently consume snacks during computer usage, which increases the daily intake of calories that contribute to obesity. Further, internet usage enables ease of access to various goods and services, and therefore reduces the need to perform errands physically. The convenience of electronic communications further reduces the need to meet up with family and friends in person, which further reduces potential opportunities to engage in physical activities.”

This tidy story points to simple solutions. The simplest, of course, would be to get rid of high speed internet. But they discard that approach because high speed internet has “substantial benefits.”

So instead, they point to other, simple approaches. “Promote awareness” of the harms caused by sedentary behavior. “Motivate people to take breaks” in screen time. “Public health campaigns could encourage the need to physically engage in errands.”

C’mon people. Let’s move!

But Seriously, Folks

Though we are not so enthusiastic about this declaration that high speed internet is “fattening,” it might serve as a useful illustration. The causes of obesity are complex and interrelated. More and more screen time is certainly a contributor, as are changes in our complex food supply, increasingly stressful lives, and exposures to drugs and chemicals that nudge us toward weight gain.

Urging people to get up and move is not a bad thought. But that approach is already ubiquitous and it hasn’t done much to reverse the rise in obesity.

Instead, simplistic mental models of this complex problem promote biased thinking and stigma for the people who live with it. As the authors of this paper illustrate so well, such thinking leads people to presume that simple solutions – which have failed before – will resolve the problem if we double down on our efforts.

It is time to embrace the complexity of obesity and pursue solutions that account for it.

Click here for this paper in Economics & Human Biology. For perspective on the complexity of obesity’s causes, click here.

Screen Time, photograph by Aaron Escobar, licensed under CC BY 2.0

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November 11, 2024