Digital disordered eating

Time-honoured channel of reaching the literati with information they seek and desire that the world knows as media, particularly dailies seems to have donned a new avatar, that is also familiar to a growing number of people embracing digital technology as social media. Chip-based devices are taking birth with versatile features being embedded in them at such a rapid pace that virtually makes the electronic goods of today seem obsolete next day. The ubiquitous hand-held mobile telephone, better described as smart phone has triggered the enormous spread of social media, youth around the world, including India, being its most conspicuous patrons, even as the rest of the population, not to forget senior members of society at large, feeling helpless as digital-illiterates. Conventional media owes in no small measure its survival to this gradually shrinking population. Even desktop computers and laptops seem to have been robbed of their space in time, given the long hours in a day witnessing the teens stuck to their hand-held smart phone. There are no laws yet for the country’s administration to regulate the content of social media, particularly the many objectionable matter, being discussed in various circles.

One of the fallouts of the present generation’s teens being engaged for the best part of the day communicating among themselves, according to a recent study by researchers, has emerged as disordered eating. One cannot be faulted to remark that this fallout doesn’t earn credit to digital technology and also to the inventors of devices such as the smart phone. The analogy is that the sharp knife also hurts when not used carefully.

The print and electronic media is rendering yeoman service to society by publishing articles by seasoned writers to enlighten people on the benefits of eating foods that sustain health and reduce disease burden bugging different sections in the population. However, not only the takers for their guidelines regarding food habits are just a fraction of the population but also in most cases it may be too late for course correction. The saying that life begins at the age of 40 and starts showing conveys the hidden message on the extent to which disordered eating hurts. According to a report published in a widely circulated daily early this week, more than half the girls interviewed revealed that they had at least one disordered eating episode along with 45 percent of the boys in the study.

Disordered eating need not be totally connected to social media as much as the emergence of roadside eateries in their thousands, as in Mysuru itself. Even if regulatory measures are introduced, implementing them in the country effectively being suspect, disordered eating is highly likely to endure, the ball being entirely in the court of teens.