a form of civic education. This fall, they are going to conduct and tape interviews<\/p>\n
and create a radio show to publicize their results. To give them some data to<\/p>\n
work fro![](\"http:\/\/www.peterlevine.ws\/images\/fastfood.GIF\")
m,<\/p>\n
we surveyed all the students in the school’s health classes. The response rate<\/p>\n
was poor, because students had to bring in parental permission slips before they could complete<\/p>\n
the survey; and there was no penalty for failing to participate. Nevertheless, we<\/p>\n
received enough surveys to draw tentative statistical conclusions. Here is the<\/p>\n
one that surprises me. None <\/i>of the 17 kids who said that they ate fast food<\/p>\n
every day are overweight (according to their self-reported combination of height and weight). However, 43% of those who said they eat "hardly<\/p>\n
any" fast food are considered clinically overweight. <\/p>\n
What’s going on? Maybe a lot of kids are mistaken or dishonest, but it’s strange<\/p>\n
that the relationship between fast food and body weight would be so linear and negative. The sample is too small for serious statistical analysis,<\/p>\n
but we noticed that immigrant kids are more likely to eat fast food, yet less<\/p>\n
likely to be overweight. So maybe immigrants eat good food at home but go out a lot<\/p>\n
to McDonalds.<\/p>\n