Recently I came across some facts about food, family and finances. The disparate information was helpful, but combined, all these findings gave me pause as to how our behavior when it comes to buying food, eating it and who we eat it with produces some very meaningful takeaways.
We all love to eat out for a lot of reasons: first of all because it gets us out of the house, which during winter is a good thing. Yet, there are some hidden drawbacks to such a “mobile menu”:
■ The average restaurant dish contains 60% more calories than a homemade meal
■ The average restaurant meal costs between $9 and $25 per person
■ The average spent for a family of four weekly at restaurants is more than $200
■ A 2000 survey found that the 9- to 14-year-olds who ate dinner with their families most frequently ate more fruits and vegetables and less soda and fried foods.
■ Diets eaten at home also had higher amounts of many key nutrients, like calcium, iron, and fiber.
■ Eating family dinners at least five times a week drastically lowers a teen’s chance of smoking, drinking, and using drugs. Teens who had fewer than three family dinners a week were 3.5 times more likely to have abused prescription drugs and to have used illegal drugs other than marijuana, three times more likely to have used marijuana, more than 2.5 times more likely to have smoked cigarettes, and 1.5 times more likely to have tried alcohol, according to the CASA report.
■ Of teens who eat with their family fewer than three times a week, 20% get C’s or lower on their report cards, according to the CASA report. Only 9% of teens who eat frequently with their families do this poorly in school. A Columbia University study found that adolescents who enjoy five to seven family dinners per week were twice as likely to earn A’s and B’s at school, compared to those teens who have fewer than three family dinners per week.
■ If you have a demanding job, finding time to eat with your family may actually leave you feeling less stressed. In 2008, researchers at Brigham Young University conducted a study of IBM workers.
■ Researchers found that young children learned 1,000 rare words at the dinner table, compared to only 143 from parents reading storybooks aloud.
■ When meal time is used to converse and bond, the impact is palpable: reports show teens who eat with their families at home show fewer signs of depression and feel more supported than those who do not.
If you have any questions about this information or title insurance, please contact Ralph Aponte: 732.914.1400.
Counsellors Title Agency, www.counsellorstitle.net, founded in 1996, is one of New Jersey’s most respected title agencies, serving all 21 New Jersey counties with title insurance, clearing title, escrow, tidelands searches, and closing and settlement services for commercial or industrial properties, waterfront properties and marinas, condominiums, townhouses or residential single family homes. Counsellors Title also features its own Attorney Settlement Assistance Program™ [ASAP], which is an individual resource customized to fit the needs specifically of real estate attorneys, including, Documentation, Preparation, Disbursement of Funds, Attendance at Closing, HUD Preparation or Post-Closing Matters.