When Obesity is a Crime: Family Communication and Individual Member Health

Abstract

It is often difficult to tease out the specific influence of individual factors on one’s health behaviors. Given that individual differences, conversations with peers and relatives, media messages, and environmental issues might have mixed effects on our health across the lifespan, a theory explaining health behaviors in more holistic ways is merited. The socio-ecological model (McLeroy, Bibeau, Stekler, & Glanz, 1988) serves this purpose by investigating individual health behaviors at the intrapersonal, interpersonal, institutional, community, and societal levels. Although focused on the family, the case study and accompanying discussion questions invite examination of the situation at each level of the socioecological model to guide evaluation of the case’s narrative comprehensively. In particular, this case study depicts the real-life events surrounding a mother’s debatable legal responsibility for her teenage son’s weight—555 pounds—and enables one to reflect on various contributing factors to health behavior by illustrating multiple, interlocking levels of influence.