Do you agree or disagree with the following statement? Advertising is the most important cause of unhealthy eating habits.
Nowadays, along with the development of modern communication technology and the proliferation of medias, advertising sprang up and exerted immense influence upon individual life over the past decades. Concerns have arisen about whether advertising is the contributing factor to unhealthy eating habits. As a matter of fact, advertising has, if any, little responsibility for unhealthy eating habits, which should be attributed to other factors.
Probably the most important reason is that unhealthy eating habits originate from an unhealthy lifestyle rather than advertising. For example, some classmates of mine indulge in the Internet or on-line games, which leaves little time to take regular meals. Rather, they have no positive alternative but to eat junk food or canned food when they are starving, thereby forming such detrimental dietary habits. In these cases, we really do not see any advertisement but unreasonable lifestyle which cultivates unhealthy eating habits.
Another supporting rationale comes from the high-speed rhythm of society. Currently, due to stiff competition and mounting workload, people are compelled to spare no effort to struggle with endless assignment, giving minimal time to prepare and eat food. To gain an abject salary, survey results have consistently shown that more than a half of employees have to dedicate more than 10 hours per day to working and commuting, which exhaust themselves substantially. Some of they suffer from insomnia, or even chronic indigestion, not to mention building reasonable dietary habits. So, in view of these contemporary phenomena, it is the increasingly rapid rhythm of society but not advertising which promotes unhealthy eating habits.
Yet another driving force which contributes to unhealthy eating habits, strange as it may seem, is the nature of humanity. In other words, unreasonable food demands incite unhealthy eating habits. Some people would like to eat popcorn when they are watching TV, no matter how long the TV lasts, they invariably keep chewing. Also, some people like eating bagged food, canned food, or frozen food, instead of fresh food, merely because they consider prepared food is more convenient and palatable. All these unhealthy eating habits should be attributed to their unreasonable food demands. In short, it is no exaggeration to say that the unreasonable food demands is one main driving force behind unhealthy eating habits.
Therefore, the unhealthy lifestyle, the rapid rhythm of modern society and unreasonable food demands are all compelling justifications to clarify what are important causes of unhealthy eating habits. We should put this phenomenon in perspective, rather than blaming advertisement rashly.
TOEFL listening lectures: A lecture from a social sciences class (2)