Questions: (Quoting boinkBoink, but the formatting's bugging me)
1. Review and evaluate research on the psychosocial factors involved in this phenomena
Personally I'd do this one, but that's because I love social psych, and I'd learn more that interests me with this one... obviously Self Esteem would be looked at, along with the people around you, how they are, how much they eat, how they feel when eating, or what caused the consumption, (ie what generally happens to a bar of chocolate when a girl is upset?) the individual's opinions to their consumption, exercise habits (and the reasons for them), etc. Probably anything but a biological reason for obesity could come into this. Advertising, fast food (ie 'supersize me')... you name it, you could twist it. ALSO, you'd look at social ways of helping it, I assume. Ie if Self Esteem is a cause/correlate, then changing it may help the disorder. As said, IMO you'll learn more from this, and probably be able to apply the general theories you learn in the future.
2. Review and evaluate research on the neurobiological bases of obesity and whether these may be impacting on this phenomena
Opposite of the above, generally. Ie. Heritability, genetics, big bones, that food is a reward and it causes this or that neurotransmitter to be released, etc. Probably a more technical essay, but easier to write (but more difficult to research in that the research is more technical) as everything's set in stone, empirical evidence, rather than theories of how this might effect that, etc. Easy if you put your mind to it. Read the textbook (Gleitman, right?) and understand the basics of neuro first, though, I think.
3. Review and evaluate research on compulsive eating disorders and clinical treatments for these conditions that may be useful in dealing with this phenomena" Personally I think this'd be the hardest, but that might be because I'm not interested in the clinical side of things. I assume this is in the journals, but in my experience journals seem consist of experiments and theories, not clinical treatments. Would require looking at which drugs are administered to help people affected by compulsive eating disorders, or the therapies they go through... I'd imagine it'd take elements from the two of the above.
fornstar said:
ive tried searching stuff on those database thingys and come up with nothing
Lol you'll need to learn how to use those thingys... you'll find a good source of articles for your essay is the references in other articles. It's good to take note as you read the article, because then you know who talks about what, and it also helps you later when you've gotta reference different peoples' ideas.
