How does this connection between entertainment and food affect people?

- Opfermann 1

Luke Opfermann

Ms. Schaner

AP Language and Composition

16 February 2022
The Two Headed Monster

The audience gasps as the lights dim and the room is filled with deep, thick blackness.

Light returns to the room as the entertainment carries on. The audience bellows with laughter and

hushes with sorrow at just the correct moments, but one other noise is heard discreetly in

between the varying emotions. A rustling noise, a crackling noise, a munching noise, a noise that

annoys many to their core. The opening of food: candy, chips, and other snacks, the counterpart

of fantastic entertainment. This noise I realized was a part of a much larger motif, a part of

something that impacts many people, a part of something that is within our daily lives that we do

not think about. How often when watching a movie, a TV show, or sports, do we eat a snack or

have a beverage? How does this connection between entertainment and food affect people? Why

did it start? How does snacking affect one’s body? What does it mean to the American consumer

today? What does it show the younger generations about eating and healthy eating?

The beginning of the connection between at home entertainment and food was in the late

1950’s with the invention of television dinners. A television dinner in the 1950’s included “a

compartmentalized aluminum tray filled with turkey, corn-bread dressing and gravy, buttered

peas, and sweet potatoes [which] appeared in grocers' freezer cases” (Gardner). Not only was the

popularization of frozen food instrumental in the connection between entertainment and food,

but the result was much greater, “We got to go into the living room and watch TV and eat”

(Gardner). This realization, at homes across the country, that dinner and watching television
 How does this connection between entertainment and food affect people? - Opfermann 2

could go together still has an impact today. This connection of dinner and television has changed

since the 1950’s. Watching television has expanded to watching shows on streaming services

such as Netflix, Hulu, HBO Max, etc. The concept of eating while watching entertainment has

been transformed to be less than a full meal and is commonly referred to as snacking.

Entertainment, an event, performance, or activity designed to entertain others, has also

included food or snacks to entertain their audience long before television dinners became a

reality. Every movie theater, athletic event, and amusement park includes food as another

promotion or reason to go there. Why do these places include food as a selling point? On the

surface, the answer is simple: people need and enjoy eating food, but people also have been

manipulated to think they need it immediately and that they need more of it. The old stereotype

of the “couch potato” is scarily true today. In a study that monitored people eating and watching

TV at the same time, the combination of those things “may impair memory of food intake and

promote over-consumption on a later meal” (Mittal, et.al). People are so engrossed in their

entertainment that they lose track of what they are eating. People will continue to eat, past the

point in which they are full, until they finish the bag of chips or candy. This is one of the reasons

why obesity is so prevalent today because people are so engulfed in entertainment and their urge

for food is so strong that they continue to eat to an unhealthy level. Another reason is the global

pandemic. We have all been at home for the last two years and to pass the time many people

watched countless movies and TV shows, and along with that have consumed food and snacks at

an all time high. As we move on from the pandemic, people are moving back into their normal

daily routines, but so is their extra weight and while the stigma around obesity is considered to

be a personal problem, that people need to and should be able to get their weight down on their
 How does this connection between entertainment and food affect people? - Opfermann 3

own, there is another player that affects this issue on top of all the other reasons mentioned,

marketing.

The marketing side of entertainment and food is a major factor that influences people to

eat while watching entertainment. How many commercials are created to make you feel hungry

and eat the chips within that refulgent bag held up by a famous celebrity? Most food marketing

is promoted on TV, so the two are connected again. “Food firms frequently employ prudent and

selected distribution schemes to advertise their products to customers” (Frechette). This

influence of marketing has increased because of the pandemic again since more people were

exposed to entertainment and by doing so were marketed food, snacks, and drinks. The

penultimate example of this connection is on a Sunday night in February, the Super Bowl. The

Super Bowl is rife as it is the most viewed entertainment night of the year. Millions of people are

watching the same thing, at the same time, creating an atmosphere that is ripe for advertising to

the masses which carries a big price tag (advertisements cost millions of dollars to air during the

game). While the marketing, the halftime show, and the football game pass by, food is being

eaten at homes across the country and in staggering amounts. “The Super Bowl is the

second-biggest food consumption event of the year, behind Thanksgiving”(USA Today). It

comes full circle because another tradition on Thanksgiving, the first-biggest food consumption

event of the year, is watching football which is a source of entertainment. All of these

connections between food and entertainment also are negatively impacting the most vulnerable

demographic of the population, kids.

“Food firms promote calorie dense, nutrient-poor foods directly to children in national

media and regional communities, negatively influencing children’s diets, augmenting their threat

of obesity and obesity-associated illness, and capitalizing on their specific exposures”(Frechette).

 How does this connection between entertainment and food affect people? - Opfermann 4

Kids are most susceptible to this kind of marketing because they are marketed through the

entertainment in which they consume. Many children’s shows have advertisements of nutrient

poor foods that negatively affect the development of children. Generally, children will follow the

actions of who they are exposed to the most whether that is a television show or their parents

who may be setting a bad influence on them in regards to overweening consumption. It is

important in the development of children to understand what healthy eating looks like and for

them to understand why not to eat unhealthy foods and the purpose of eating healthy foods. The

example of the Super Bowl is the tip of the iceberg of unhealthy eating habits. The Super Bowl is

just one day of the year though which leads to further questioning. Do we eat like this everyday

of the year or does this entertainment just give us a reason too? The reality is that unhealthy

eating habits impact people everyday and keep them going back into a circle of pain from

obesity, to guilt, through mental health problems, and lasting emotional pain. How do people get

out of this cycle? What are their options? Lasting change starts with small, simple, consistent

steps that build the determination and discipline required to make a change in one’s self. This

issue, however, is not a one person problem. This is a societal problem, a problem that has a long

history of impacting people, in difficult and in different ways. There is not one solution to fix this

problem. To fix this problem the marketing promoters of these ideas need to face reduction,

further inspection, and careful regulation first to protect the youngest generation and second to

fix the problem in the current generation. The consumers of these ideas, the general public, need

to realize that they are impacting themselves negatively and their decisions could also impact

their children and families negatively. To visualize this lifestyle change one small habit could be

that every time a thought or hand reaches towards that tempting bag of goodies one can instill

discipline to stop and control that urge and resist it consistently.

 How does this connection between entertainment and food affect people? - Opfermann 5

The noise in my ear finally softened, but would return. I realized that while I was sitting

in that movie theater in a matter of a few seconds and a rush of thoughts, I had a substantive

lead on this essay. Writing this essay has enlarged my perspective on what can be considered a

cultural event. A cultural event can be more than a one time event. A cultural event is expanded

to encompass an entire cultural lifestyle, a cultural experience. I discovered one question within

the pool of questions related to how people live their lives and the consistencies in our society.

The noise returned to my ears from beside me as I heard a crackling noise, my brother

who had brought Skittles from home, created a noise by opening the pouch. I settled into my seat

and my focus drifted back to the movie as I, hypocritically, became engrossed watching some

guy fly around with webs, along with the sweet taste of candy in my mouth.

Works Cited

Cowan, Alexandra E., et al. “Examination of Different Definitions of Snacking Frequency and

Associations with Weight Status among U.S. Adults.” PLoS ONE, vol. 15, no. 6, June

2020, pp. 1–19. EBSCOhost, https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0234355.

Frechette, Steven. “Food Marketing as a Relevant Determinant of Childhood Obesity: The Link

between Exposure to Tv Food Advertising and Children’s Body Weight.” American

Journal of Medical Research, vol. 2, no. 2, July 2015, pp. 182–87. EBSCOhost,

https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=111470247&site=eho

st-live.

Gardner, Marilyn. “Dining for 45 Years with an American Icon.” Christian Science Monitor, vol.

91, no. 91, 7 Apr. 1999, p. 15. EBSCOhost,

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live.
 How does this connection between entertainment and food affect people? - Opfermann 6

“Oxford Learner's Dictionaries: Find Definitions, Translations, and Grammar Explanations at

Oxford Learner's Dictionaries.” Oxford Learner's Dictionaries | Find Definitions,

Translations, and Grammar Explanations at Oxford Learner's Dictionaries,

https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/.

Mittal, Dolly, et al. “Snacking While Watching TV Impairs Food Recall and Promotes Food

Intake on a Later TV Free Test Meal.” Applied Cognitive Psychology, vol. 25, no. 6, Nov.

2011, pp. 871–77. EBSCOhost, https://doi.org/10.1002/acp.1760.

“Food for Thought on Super Bowl Sunday.” USA Today. EBSCOhost,

https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=J0E037545407404&s

ite=ehost-live. Accessed 23 Feb. 2022