Find skinny friends, quickly

You’ve got friends over for dinner or you’re out for drinks. When you look around the table, what do you see? The odds suggest a lot of people the same basic size and shape as you.

Time examined a recent study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, which suggests that tweens’ and teens’ eating habits might be related to the eating habits of their friends. The research discovered that overweight children eat more when eating with overweight friends:

Lead researcher and clinical psychologist Sarah-Jeanne Salvy says her

research demonstrates an eye-opening social theory: Obesity can be contagious.

The idea of catching obesity suggests we could start viewing obesity an illness. Instead of seeing obesity as a causal factor for diabetes or heart disease, obesity could be its own category. We already have treatments in the form of lap-band surgery and weight-loss medication. Medicalization also removes some of the personal responsibility issues from the debate.