UK parliament research briefing
April 28, 2021: Professor Stanley Ulijaszek contributes to latest UK Parliament Research Briefing on Childhood Obesity
Read the briefing at the UK Parliament website.
Changes in mental health, eating and physical activity in England across Covid-19 pandemic lockdown
July 20, 2020: UBVO have released the first Insight Report as part of the Social Sciences Division Urgent Response Fund project 'Identifying changes in household eating and activity patterns during the Covid-19 pandemic.'
Read the report on our policy papers page.
covid-19 and lock-down: what it did to how we eat
podcast series
Tess Bird and Stanley Ulijaszek interview a range of people, about how Covid-19 lock-down influenced how and what they ate
Obesity ConferEnce
Obesity: a growing problem around the world
Monday 16 September 2019 9.30 - 16.00
Green Templeton College, University of Oxford
Generating discussions on broad approaches to understanding obesity around the world and its relation to human development, social wellbeing, food environment, food and health policy.
WHY BMI CAN BE MISLEADING, AND YOU CAN BE HEALTHY AND OVERWEIGHT
Stanley Ulijaszek interviewed in Newsweek on why body mass index can misleading, in relation to United States President Donald Trump’s rise into the body mass index category of obese.
15 February 2019
Full article given here
https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-obesity-bmi-overweight-1332943
Grandparental support helps reduce the risk of child obesity
A new study from the Karolinska Institutet, including two UBVO collaborators (Stanley Ulijaszek and Pauline Nowicka), has shown how important the support from grandparents could be. The study shows that emotional support from grandparents may have a preventive effect against childhood obesity. Greater social support for families with small children could help alleviate stress in parents, who will thereby be in a better position to make better food choices.
Publication
Low grandparental social support combined with low parental socioeconomic status is closely associated with obesity in preschool-aged children: A pilot study
Louise Lindberg, Anna Ek, Jonna Nyman, Claude Marcus, Stanley Ulijaszek, Paulina Nowicka
Pediatric Obesity, https//doi: 10.1111/ijpo.12049
Obesity a major killer for Pacific Islanders: Radio Interview
Stanley Ulijaszek (UBVO Director), and Amy McLennan (UBVO Administrator) recently spoke to Robyn Williams of ABC Radio’s ‘The Science Show’ about their research on obesity in the Pacific islands.
The complete interview is available here:
UBVO CONTRIBUTES TO WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION POLICY ON CHILDHOOD OBESITY
Michelle Pentecost and Stanley Ulijaszek contribute to the World Health Organization Report of the Commission on Ending Childhood Obesity, 2016. Their contribution, along with colleagues at Harvard and Johns Hopkins Universities, was on how inequalities structure childhood obesity.
The report can be found here
Rosie Kay,Leverhulme Artist in Residence
Rosie Kay, the first choreographer appointed as Leverhulme Artist in Residence at the Unit for Biocultural Variation and Obesity, is working in close collaboration with Professor Stanley Ulijaszek, Dr Karin Eli, and other UBVO anthropologists. Rosie Kay and Karin Eli’s joint project is entitled Choreographing lived experience: the stories that dancing bodies tell.
Astor Visiting Lecturer: Adam Drewnowski 22-25 April 2008
Professor Drewnowski, Director of the Exploratory Center for Obesity Research at the University of Washington, came to the Unit 22-25 April 2008 to present a series of lectures on his globally-renowned research into obesity and its relationships to taste and satiety, economics, inequality and health. The remit of Professor Drewnowski’s Center in Seattle is to devise transdisciplinary approaches to obesity research, with a focus on the environment, economics, and public health policy. This is complementary to the recently formed Unit for Biocultural Variation and Obesity, whose aims are to develop multidisciplinary approaches to obesity.
Lecture 1: Mapping Poverty and Obesity
Lecture 2: Sweet Taste, Satiety and Food Reward
Lecture 3: Do Healthier Diets Cost More?
Lecture 4: Food, Incomes and Health
Age, economic insecurity, and mental health in England across Covid-19 pandemic lockdown
August 24, 2020: UBVO have released the second Insight Report as part of the Social Sciences Division Urgent Response Fund project 'Identifying changes in household eating and activity patterns during the Covid-19 pandemic.'
Read the report on our policy papers page.
changing the conversation -podcasts on eating disorders and covid-19
Liron Cohen and Karin Eli talk about anxiety and eating disorders during the Covid-19 pandemic
OCD and Anxiety During the COVID-19 Pandemic
Eating Disorders Treatment during the COVID-19 Pandemic Ft. Rachel Bachner-Melman
MATERIALITIES OF Obesity AND EATING DISORDERS WORKSHOP- NEW DIRECTIONS FOR POLICY?
Monday 30 March 2020 14.00 - 16.30
by video conference
This workshop considers ways in which the material culture of home environments can shape the development and experience of eating disorders and obesity. The work responds to a policy-relevant need for understanding how everyday material culture can influence people’s eating behaviours and practices.
UNDERSTANDING OBESITY AND EATING DISORDERS THROUGH THE MATERIAL CULTURE OF THE HOME
A collaboration between the School of Anthropology and the Nuffield Department of Population Health, University of Oxford.
5 September 2019
Body size, body norms and some unintended consequences of obesity intervention in the Pacific islands
A new study coauthored by Amy McLennan shows that while Pacific Islanders have experienced over 50 years of obesity interventions, such interventions mostly fail because they re-shape people’s body norms in ways that are confusing to them.
Publication
Body size, body norms and some unintended consequences of obesity intervention in the Pacific islands
Jessica Hardin, Amy K. McLennan & Alexandra Brewis
Annals of Human Biology, 2018, 45:3, 285-294.
Nobel Prize Dialogue Tokyo, Yokohama, Japan
Stanley Ulijaszek (UBVO Director) was recently a participant at the Nobel Prize Dialogue Tokyo 2018, on the Future of Food. Two Panel discussions with Nobel Laurates Johann Deisenhofer and Sir Tim Hunt on “What we eat and why? Anthropological, historical and cultural reasons” and “The obesity epidemic” detailed the complexities of understanding both.
Oxford obesity research featured in The Telegraph
The Telegraph recently featured research from Dr Amy McLennan and Professor Stanley Ulijaszek on how social change under colonial rule has contributed to the current rates of obesity on Nauru and the Cook Islands in the Pacific. The study’s title is ‘Obesity emergence in the Pacific islands: why understanding colonial history and social change is important’ and was first published in the Journal of Public Health Nutrition (August 2014).
See ‘British made Pacific islanders fat by civilising them with fried food.’ The Telegraph. (29 August 2014)
UBVO and Amy Sharrocks’ Museum of Water
As part of a series of events for the Museum of Water, Professor Stanley Ulijaszek delivered a talk entitled Water and evolution of the human diet on Tuesday 17 June, at Somerset House.
Water is in many ways taken for granted in everyday life, but is fundamental to what we are and who we are. From population expansions out of Africa to the present-day, water has shaped migration and settlement patterns, foraging practices and behaviours, and food security both globally and locally. Water is embedded in human metabolism and in the structure of food. It is vital for food production and consumption. This talk described the many ways in which water is implicated in the human diet: if we are what we eat, what we eat and how we eat is shaped by water.
For the podcast of the talk, click here
Workshop: Food Systems Advocacy
This afternoon seminar, held at St Cross College on 22 May 2014, presented working papers on food systems advocacy, developed as part of the Oxford Food Governance Group’s project on consumer engagements with food governance.
Click here for more information