First half of translation

Why are Americans fatter than Frenchmen?

One in three Americans is fat, but only one in ten Frenchmen. Behind these figures researchers have found deep cultural differences. In perception of food and meals, the USA and France stand as opposites in many ways.

France and the USA have many similarities. Both are rich industrialized nations, leading western nations, there, modernization came simultaneously, and in both countries slenderness became an ideal from 1890-the turn of the century and forward (before this, women in the bourgeoisie wore well-padded clothing to seem more filled-out).

Still, both countries are radically different in how one has succeeded to live up to the ideal. In the USA, today about 30% of the adult population is fat--they have BMI, Body Mass Index, over 30--while the percentage of fat in France is only 10%. The USA is the fattest country in the world, while France is of the smallest.

What are the causes of this dramatic difference? A part of it may be due to the fact that the average American gets around in a car and watches TV more than the average Frenchman and therefore probably moves less. But also, researchers claim, a large part of the explanation lies in deep cultural differences both countries in perception of food and meals.

Gap between Europe and the USA
The French sociologist Claude Fischler, head of an interdisciplinary research institute in Paris, has specialized to study attitudes and beliefs concerning food in different countries. In the beginning of the 2000s, he led a very comprehensive examination of attitudes toward food and meals in six countries: France, the USA, England, Germany, Italy, and Switzerland. The whole study has interviewed over 7000 people.

The examination shows a large gap between continental Europe and the USA, while England lies somewhere in between. The actual opposites are France and the USA. Differences in attitudes can explain a large part of the differences in fatness, says Claude Fischler.

-When Americans speak of food, they speak of nutrition and health, he says. It is only fat, proteins, and calories. When Frenchmen speak of food, they speak of flavor and quality. In interviews recurringly, Frenchmen speak often of the joy of sitting at table and enjoying a good meal with friends or family. Americans say not a word about any pleasure that comes with eating.


Despite Americans’ constant obsession with their health in connection with the food, they rarely succeed to live up to these requirements: only a third say that they actually eat healthy. Among Frenchmen, most think of enjoyment, three quarters of them eat healthy. For much concern around the food seems very counterproductive.


Choice vs. Tradition
Another difference between the countries is that Americans see eating as an individual’s own responsibility, while meals for Frenchmen are anchored in a social tradition. In responses to interview questions, Americans stress all the time how important it is with choice; of these reasons they prefer, for example, an ice cream shop with fifty flavors to choose from, rather than having ten. Frenchmen, however, prefer a store with ten flavors, where they probably assess the chance that the ice cream shop has homemade ice cream and of good quality.

In the USA a large amount of meals are ingested individually and on the go, while Frenchmen hold fast to their meal order (swedishism??) with breakfast, lunch, and dinner. A large  investigation from 2002, done by the French equivalent of the Public Health Institute, shows that nine Frenchmen out of ten still eat in this way, they spend a total of an hour and a half per day for these three meals, and eight out of ten eat their dinner with family. These differences have a large significance in the obesity epidemic, says Claude Fischler:

-The American vision is based from an understood hypothesis that the individual self can regulate its food intake to be sure it is in balance. But this hypothesis is actually not scientifically based. I think that we need support of collective social regulations.

-In France there is a stong culture around meals, with a number of principles that most still hold fast: that one will adjust the food with the seasons, that it is important with rigid meals and such. I believe that these rules have protected many Frenchmen from obesity. The food is part of a collective and social sphere, where it is a given that one sits at table at a specific time and does not eat between meals.