Consumo de alimentos e obesidade na perspectiva transformativa do consumidor

Abstract

In recent past years, overweight and obesity have become a global epidemic that affects more than one billion people worldwide (WHO, 2004). According to Peng (2004), the number of overweight and obese people continues to grow, posing a major threat to public health. Given this situation, food consumption seems to be related to this epidemic. Because it is one of the most important activities of the human being, not only because of necessity, but also because it involves economic, social, psychological and cultural aspects, it requires constant monitoring in order to understand how this situation can be controlled. Thus, the objective of this work is to understand how food consumption is related to obesity. For this, the theoretical-epistemological option used was the Practice Theory that changed the focus from the individual consumer to the collective aspects of consumption. As this research has a transformative perspective of the consumer that aims at the quality of life, the participatory methodology inspired by the Action Research enabled the participation of a universe of people that somehow seek changes in feeding behavior. Participant Observation was carried out in support groups for people with eating disorders, including 24 semi-structured interviews. It was possible to understand that food consumption related to overweight and obesity is based on flexible practices. From the elaboration of a typology of practices it was clear the involvement of a series of consumer items that are present in order to meet a daily demand. In the final considerations are described contributions to future participatory research, as well as other contributions to the field of Marketing and Consumption and Transformative Consumer Research.