In our super-sized world where everything from our car interiors, the portions we consume, and even our precious coffee drinks have grown in scale, so too has our country's weight. Headlines and PSAs have hammered the hazards of obesity into our brains for so long that it's become something like white noise — another piece of static in the nightly news roundups. But, seeing the change in Americans' weight is pretty remarkable.
After a trip to Thailand, designer Lih Chen dove deep into how (and what) Americans eat. He noticed many (presumably) Western tourists eating Burger King in a Bangkok mall, and wondered why we flock to places such as Burger King even when we're hundreds of miles away from the States. His research led him to obesity statistics, and the steady rise of the number of overweight and obese people. Inspiration hit Chen after the American Medical Association decided to label obesity as a disease, prompting him to map the issue state by state.
His findings span from 1995 to 2011, and are designed in a beautiful infographic that shows the increasing obesity percentages compared to overweight and normal percentages (although, what's considered "normal" is certainly up for debate). Chen's research and presentation work in concert with the words and numbers on paper. Seeing graphs fluctuate has a stronger effect then merely reading about it. Forgive the cliché, but you know what they say about a picture being worth a thousand words.... (Packershack
Photo: Courtesy of Lih Chen.