In The News

Compiled by Amanda Stiver

Overloading on "Healthy" Food?
Recent studies have shown that diners tend to eat more at restaurants perceived as serving healthy food than those who eat at other restaurants. Apparently, individuals underestimate the calorie content of "healthy" food and eat more of it.

The studies asked subjects to eat at certain establishments and then estimate the calorie content of the foods they had consumed. On average, in one study patrons of Subway underestimated their meals by 151 calories as compared to those eating at McDonald's. This difference could lead to a possible weight gain of nearly five pounds a year if such meals were eaten on a regular basis.

Dr. Pierre Chandon of the research institution INSEAD in Fontainebleau, France, and Dr. Brian Wansink of Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, suggest that thinking objectively about calorie content will help diners avoid getting swayed by the perception of one food being healthier than another ("People Eat More in ‘Healthy' Restaurants," Journal of Consumer Research, October 2007).

Of course, if we are aware of this tendency, we can be realistic about the calorie content. It is much better for our health to get calories filled with vitamins and minerals than empty calories from fat and sugar, for example.

Japan Speeds Up
The Japanese broadband Internet infrastructure allows super high speeds. An aggressive fiber-optic cable installation program implemented by Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp. (NTT), along with a national electrical infrastructure using higher quality copper wire, installed following the destruction of the Second World War, has provided the physical basis for higher speed and better quality Internet connections in Japan, surpassing the United States and competing with South Korea and Europe.

Such speeds allow the Japanese to watch high-quality, full-screen television and to have teleconferences over the Internet. Plans for telemedicine are now possible, with improved image quality allowing doctors to diagnose patients by way of Internet cameras (Blaine Harden, "Japan's Warp-Speed Ride to Internet Future," The Washington Post, Aug. 29, 2007).

Real Friends in a Virtual World?
New York University recently held a "Facebook in the Flesh" seminar to introduce incoming freshman to the seemingly lost art of face-to-face conversation. Web sites like MySpace, Friendster and Facebook promote the rapid acquisition of friends whose photos users may display on a page. New Web sites have emerged promising to provide friend decoys, eye-catching people who will help a user to attract even more friends. Collecting hundreds or even a thousand virtual friends is reportedly not uncommon.

According to Will Reader of Sheffield Hallam University in Britain, "Although the numbers of friends people have on these sites can be massive, the actual number of close friends is approximately the same in the face to face real world"—an average of five close friends (Christine Rosen, "More, but Not Merrier," The Wall Street Journal, Oct. 5, 2007).

Proverbs 27:17 says, "As iron sharpens iron, a friend sharpens a friend" (New Living Translation). The best way to sharpen a friendship is to be there, in person.

Web Poker Addiction
Internet gaming in the truest sense of the phrase—high stakes online poker—is now a fast-growing industry estimated at $12 billion a year. However, only 5 percent of those playing have sustained success. The other 95 percent lose.

In the past five years, poker has gone from a private leisure activity to one of the highest-rated televised "sports," second only to football. Based on the legends of highly successful online players who have won great wealth in face-to-face tournaments, the number of college students actively gambling online has surged.

A University of Connecticut survey "found that one out of every four college students who gambles online fits the clinical definition of a pathological gambler, suggesting that hundreds of thousands of students may be addicted" (Michael Werner, "All In? The Stakes Are Rising as Internet Poker Gains Popularity Among College Students," Oregon Quarterly, Autumn 2007).

Instead of trying to take the wealth of others through winning bets against them, the Bible encourages us to obtain income through work (see 1 Thessalonians 4:11; Proverbs 13:11). For more on what the Bible says about gambling, see our "Teen Bible Study Discussion Guide: Gambling".

Tattoo Trouble
New concerns about medical complications from tattoos have caused several Canadian doctors to warn pregnant women about the dangers of tattoos on the lower back. This area of the body is the location where needles for epidural procedures are injected, carrying painkilling medicine to ease labor pains.

Although no studies have yet been conducted, isolated cases have occurred that suggest microscopic pieces of skin stained with ink from the tattoos could get caught at the tip of the needle and be carried to nerves deep in the back, causing sensitivity, pain and burning.

Concerns that the metal in tattoo ink can cause burning during a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) procedure are also supported by recent cases of injury (Rachel Zimmerman, "Why Some Expectant Moms Are Worried About Tattoos," The Wall Street Journal, Sept. 18, 2007).

For more on tattoos, see "Leave a Permanent Mark".

Middle-Aged Immaturity?
Brain researchers at Temple University have found that the adolescent brain tends to direct young people toward thrill seeking and impulsive behavior because of the long maturation process of the human cognitive-control system. Such findings help explain the tendency of teenagers to indulge in reckless and dangerous behavior.

However, similar studies have found that the age group spanning 35 to 54 years has an even worse record. Incidences of drug-abuse deaths, incarceration for violent crimes and major felonies among this group have increased 550, 600 and 200 percent respectively since the mid-1970s in the United States.

Sadly, the "baby boomer" generation has exhibited more signs of immaturity as it has aged, while succeeding generations have a track record of better behavior as they grow older (Mike Males, "This Is Your (Father's) Brain on Drugs," The New York Times, Sept. 17, 2007).

Eardrum Damage
Are your ears taking a beating? Do you frequently have earbuds growing from them? If so, it might be time to turn down the volume on that MP3 player.

A study done in Manchester, Birmingham and Brighton, England, found that the average listening device user typically turned up the volume to above 85 decibels, which can lead to hearing loss. That many decibels sustained over the course of one hour has come to be recognized as the maximum level of sound that is healthy for the human ear.

Another study in the United Kingdom found that most users of personal listening devices (such as the iPod) don't know the guidelines for healthy listening. The combination of intense loudness from in-ear phones and long-term use are the main culprits in hearing damage. The same study found that keeping sound levels to 60 percent of maximum and not using earbuds for more than 30 minutes a day can prevent substantial hearing loss ("Les Ecouteurs Sont-ils Dangereux Pour L'Ouie? [Earphones, Are They Dangerous to Hearing?]," Le Figaro, Oct. 3, 2007).

Dangerous Debt and Credit Card Catastrophes
Legislators in the United States are seeking to rein in credit card companies that give large lines of credit to unemployed college students. This practice sets up students to graduate with excess credit card debt before finding stable income.

Credit card companies often rely on legal loopholes and variable interest rates to make a profit, but for students who don't fully understand the effect of long-term payments and debt on their credit record, these practices can seriously affect their finances.

The final responsibility, however, comes down to the individual, and Jessica Silver-Greenberg of Business Week provides a few ideas to help young people build good credit and stabilize their finances ("Fixing the College Credit-Card Mess," Sept. 7, 2007):

• Limit the amount of debt you incur. Choose cards with a credit line of $1,000 to $2,000 instead of multiple thousands to avoid the temptation of excessive spending.

• Be an informed student and understand all the fine print that comes with credit card statements to avoid missing key information.

• Avoid credit vendors that have a record of unfair business dealing, and pay off credit bills on time and fully, whenever possible.

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