Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

140 Characters To Skinny: Social Support Provided By Commercial Weight-Loss Programs Via Twitter, Sarah Arbogast

All Theses

The state of healthcare in the United States is changing. Amidst this change, there is a debate as to whether health is a public good or if health is a private matter. This change and debate challenges health professionals to rethink the way we go about planning health interventions to better address the many public health issues looming the general population today. The recent rise of obesity and at-risk weight in the United States is a major epidemic that has yet to be resolved. There are many approaches to addressing weight management and for many, public health campaigns have not …

Liminal Losers: Breakdowns And Breakthroughs In Reality Television's Biggest Hit, Caitlin Rickert

Masters Theses

This study explores how The Biggest Loser, a popular television reality program that features a weight-loss competition, reflects and magnifies established stereotypes about obese individuals. The show, which encourages contestants to lose weight at a rapid pace, constructs a broken/fixed dichotomy that oversimplifies the complex issues of obesity and health.

My research is a semiotic analysis of the eleventh season of the program (2011), focusing on three pairs of contestants (or “couples” teams) that each represent a different level of commitment to the program’s values. Specifically, I focus on dramatic “breakdown” moments in which these contestants are disciplined by …

Framed Golden Arch Messages: A Content Analysis Of Mcdonald's Television Commercials In Correlation With The Obesity Epidemic Around The Globe, Laura Leanne Macauley

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Obesity is a growing problem all around the world. Fast food companies invest billions of dollars every year intending to sell their new and improved menu items. This study examined one of the largest fast food companies in the world, McDonalds. The present study investigated how McDonalds communicates nutritional claims as well as portion size throughout television commercial messages. The countries that took part in this examination were the United States, Canada, India, and Japan. Each of these countries has much different percentage rates of obese citizens. A content analysis examined one commercial in each of the four countries. In …