Does Facebook Make You Fat?

Could your time on Facebook give you a bigger waistline? Unfortunately, yes. Here is the evidence and why you might want to sort your priorities.

“I’ll Just Post a Status Update”

For many people it has become a habit: they get home from school or work and one of the first things they do, sometimes even before taking off their shoes, is getting online and checking what is happening on Facebook. Heck, those having smartphones get their updates already on the way home and then they just transfer their online activity from the phone to their computer.

In a study, scientists at the University of Ulster now checked if our social media habits could have any negative consequences on our health. It seems they can, because the more time the study’s participants spent on Facebook, the less physically active they were.

That doesn’t mean that this necessarily makes you fat, but it is likely. After all, a day has only that many hours for you to do stuff and I have yet to see someone doing proper push-ups while posting “zomg, I got the new iPhone!!!!”

Are Your Social Media Habits Healthy?

The study also said that on average people spend one hour per day on Facebook. One hour is more time than I need to finish one of my workouts.

It of course is just a personal choice of mine to spend less time socializing on the internets and an entirely conceited activity, that only concerns itself with my well-being. Probably it makes me an egoist that I don’t immediately have to be aware of Frank and Wendy having a decaf Frappuccino at Starbucks at 3.54 pm.

But let me ask you what, at the end of your life, you are more likely going to say: “Gee, I wish I had spent more time on Facebook” or “I should have exercised a bit more”?

Picture courtesy of Robert S. Donovan.