40 Percent of American Children Think Hot Dogs Are Vegetables

https://futurism.com/american-children-hot-dogs-vegetables

by andrew-ld • 4 years ago

28 27 4 years ago

futurism.com

type_Ben_struct• 4 years ago

Link to the research: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S027249442...

On a more positive note, at least 100% of the children correctly identified that you can’t eat sand.

Aeolun• 4 years ago

What nonsense. You can eat sand just fine. It’s just not very tasty and has zero nutritional value.

I imagine the lethal dose is also fairly low, but meh, everything is lethal in a large enough quantity.

lol768• 4 years ago

On a more positive note, at least 100% of the children correctly identified that you can’t eat sand.

Does the study actually say this? As far as I can tell, it says that 1.14% of participants incorrectly suggested that both sand and dirt were edible (in the "Edibility Sorting Task" results)

dotcoma• 4 years ago

I’m also worried about those who think that french fries are vegetables…

dorkwood• 4 years ago

I don't understand. Aren't potatoes vegetables?

credit_guy• 4 years ago

I may be killing GP's joke, but here it goes. Potatoes are part of the regnum vegetabile, also known as vegetable.

But in the context of food, at least in the US, vegetables are understood to be things like broccoli, bell peppers, zucchini, asparagus, celery root, parsnips. Potatoes are not considered vegetables.

Of course, you don't want to get into the whole controversy about tomatoes being vegetable or fruit. Some people even take this controversy further, to say bell peppers are actually fruit, and not vegetables.

badrabbit• 4 years ago

Hmm veggie franks are ok. In a way, meat franks are bio-processed animal feed.

radford-neal• 4 years ago

This trips my implausibility detector. Aside from the results themselves, one red flag is that they describe the subjects only as "living in a metropolitan area located in the southeastern region of the United States". What possible legitimate reason could there be for not identifying the specific metropolitan area where the subjects lived?

Isamu• 4 years ago

My friend relies on his implausibility detector quite a lot. He never takes care to calibrate it though. It’s leading to a rift in our friendship.

bell-cot• 4 years ago

Noteworthy - "Children" in the study were 4 to 7 years old. [Edit - and living in a metropolitan area.] If asked, most of them probably didn't know where tap water comes from, nor electricity for their home, nor ...

Vaguely related: at least one die-hard vegan mom I know was committed to regularly feeding her kids meat until well into their teens - because being notably shorter (caused by not getting animal protein as a kid, at least in her mind) and eating different would be two big, painful strikes against her kids, in the often-cruel milieu of other children.

squarefoot• 4 years ago

If asked, most of them probably didn't know where tap water comes from

Why I can't but think of this doc.. er ...movie scene??

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIZ9YuPm_Ls

datavirtue• 4 years ago

It's a thing with highschool kids as well. We have some inside family jokes from going to the grocery store and having a young kid scan our groceries (checkout). The weird looks and the drama that ensues when they don't know what cauliflower is ("white broccoli").

You throw kolrabi or dragon fruit at them and they curl up in a fetal position.

Basically all produce would have them flipping through picture manuals or calling the manager or having us explain to them what it was so they could search.

goodpoint• 4 years ago

4 to 7 years old ... most of them probably didn't know where tap water comes from, nor electricity for their home

That's still very bad.

xnyan• 4 years ago

Most adults and I could not tell you where their water or electricity come from besides “the utility company”, not much more informative in my opinion.

dudul2• 4 years ago

No it's not. Why does it matter if a 4 year old doesn't know what a vegetable is? 4 year old don't know what a bank is, or how many days are in a year, why does it matter? If the sample was only 7 year old kids i would agree, but this sample is irrelevant.

pipeline_peak3• 4 years ago

If avoiding animal protein stunts growth, doesn’t that mean we should be consuming it?

I can’t help but think people lack other things by avoiding it in their adult life.

hombre_fatal• 4 years ago

Animal protein isn’t magical. It’s just that inadequately planning a diet results in deficiencies. Just like how Americans eat meat but aren’t walking examples of good nutrition (e.g. no fiber intake).

pdpi• 4 years ago

When you’re growing you have different nutritional needs in general, and it’s kind of hard to get some micronutrients from plants. I wouldn’t be surprised if those two things put together meant that vegan diets are problematic for children but not for adults.

At any rate, even if a vegan diet is unhealthy for you, it’s a reasonable choice to make — I’ll sacrifice my health to do what I think is morally correct. Crucially, though, it’s a choice you have to make, and your parents shouldn’t be making for you. Once they grow up and are mature enough to decide for themselves, they can choose to go vegan.

Overall I have some issues with veganism, but, if you’re going to do it, this is an approach I can agree with (compared to a family friend who feeds her cats vegan cat food, despite them being obligate carnivores)

dudul2• 4 years ago

176 children between the age of 4 and 7. So I guess some of them also believe in fairies, think that the light in the fridge is controlled by a tiny man living in the door and don't know how electricity gets to the house.

This is stupid.

pipeline_peak3• 4 years ago

Cool tabloid

trynewideas• 4 years ago

I would legitimately enjoy finding out what 40 percent of 4-7 year olds think about everything, actually. They're stupid and don't care.

JoeAltmaier2• 4 years ago

Some hot dogs are made of vegetables. Did they control for that?

bombcar• 4 years ago

You can ask a four year old if a hotdog is a vegetable and get a yes or no if you want, just in how you ask. Kids often want to please.

40 Percent of American Children Think Hot Dogs Are Vegetables

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