News You Can't Use: Obese to Wear Waist Sensors for Federal Study

Despite the seemingly endless run of that fat camp television show we've still got a big (haw haw) problem with obesity in America. Somehow watching food victims waddle up stairs to a giant scale for forty-five advertisement riddled minutes has done little to change the gorging and lazing habits that represent the closest thing we have to a shared national vision. Fortunately, our government is on the case and we've all seen their track record of success. We're going to attach sophisticated sensors to people with real bodies not like those Hollywood sticks and will, presumably, get real-time "Are you allowed to have a jelly doughnut?" updates or something.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) is spending $1.7 million to monitor how and what obese families eat, tracking their eating via sensors they wear on their waists.

I guess we could just ask them, but you know how physical and moral failure walk arm-in-arm, so sensors must be deployed. Who is agreeing to this? "Hey fat boy, how would you like to wear an electronic device on your bloat that will document your pathetic lack of self-control?" Who could say no to that?

The research, conducted by the University of Southern California (USC) and the University of Virginia, began this month. Families will be monitored for months at a time.

I...want...my...fancy...degree. Man, that ain't working, you do the research at the Uni-verse-it-tee. That's the way to do it, grants for nothing and unearned respect for free. Let me tell, them guys ain't dumb. Maybe get a blister on your sensor finger, maybe get some chocolate stains on your thumb. What's that? Obesity studies? He's banging on a table like a chim-pan-zee.

A leading researcher on the project said the study is a “novel” approach to fighting childhood obesity.

Yeah, I suppose that's one way to describe this massive waste of time and money that might, if we get lucky, reveal that obese individuals take in more calories than they expend.

“Recent advances in remote sensing have provided a new paradigm for tracking human behavior, but obesity-related efforts focused directly on diet and activity have been hampered by not only the accuracy of behavior tracking (especially dietary intake) but also the lack of behavioral theories and dynamic models for personalized just-in-time, adaptive interventions (JITAIs),” according to a grant for the project. 

Let's try to parse this word swamp into vernacular English. "The rise of big brother and 'we are the dead' technology is giving us new ways to treat people like lab rats but when it comes to fatties [impenetrable and meaningless academic babble] so please give us money." Sorry, that was the best I could do.

“Current behavioral science suggests that family eating dynamics (FED) have high potential to impact child and parent dietary intake and obesity rates.”

LOL., FED amirite? USC and Virgina, master trolls messing with old Uncle Sucker.

The project will use wearable wireless sensors to track the family’s eating habits, in the hopes of bring about “behavior modification.”

We'll play some Beethoven, show you a video of someone eating a cake and inject drugs that make you physically ill.

Maybe sensors could help explain it.

The project, dubbed M2FED, is using a system of “in-home beacons, wireless and wearable sensors, and smartphones” to collect real time data of what the research subjects are eating. 

Everyone staring into tiny electronic devices is fixing every other aspect of our society so it makes sense to deploy it here.

USC has received $1,047,961 so far for the project. The University of Virginia received $689,315.

Thanks taxpayers!

“It is a pretty ambitious project, but the data that we accrue will be absolutely novel and informative,” she said. “We are going to learn many new things with this proposal about how family systems function dynamically around food and eating, and how this impacts eating behavior.”

Think of the "most of it actually gets into the mouth instead of flying off as crumbs" breakthroughs we'll be making!

Spruijt-Metz’s Obesity Research and Mobile Health Lab at USC uses technology to develop “culturally sensitive, evidence based approaches to promote health behavior change.”

It's like solving the world's hardest mystery, while walking on eggshells to avoid offending anyone.

Spruijt-Metz is also leading a $1,131,922 study for the National Institutes of Health that turned First Lady Michelle Obama’s White House garden into a video game.

Escape the Witch's Garden of Evil before she can seize our beloved grease food! Dodge foul-tasting "nutritious" government meals and earn big points for grabbing those yummy cheeseburgers!

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Aaron Zehner is the author of "The Foolchild Invention" available in paperback and e-book format. Read free excerpts here and here.