Research & Data Collection – Problem

Luckily, STRIPED already has many resources that you can use to gather important information on the problem and the policy. Research into the problem of your issue will need to be shared with grassroots advocates, prospective coalition partners, lawmakers and their staff, public officials, and the media. When making your case, just remember that your audience does not need to know everything about your issue; they just need to know enough – and feel enough – to make a decision to take action.

When presenting the problem, we want to make sure that we have data that at a minimum includes:

• • Scope of the problem to demonstrate how many people are impacted
    • • Estimated number of people with eating disorders in the state
      • Number of ER visits due to eating disorders
      • Number of inpatient hospitalizations due to eating disorders
      • Estimated cost to the state’s economy as a result of eating disorders

Find your state’s social and economic costs of eating disorders here.

• • Demographics and characteristics of those most impacted
  • Examples of celebrities, athletes or other public figures connected with your state who have gone public with their own experiences with eating disorders  or how they have been harmed by over-the-counter diet pills
    • • “29 Stars Who Battled Eating Disorders — and Came Out Stronger”
      • “9 Celebrities with Eating Disorders”
      • “30 Celebrities Get Real About What It’s Like to Live With an Eating Disorder”
  • Health effects of eating disorders, dieting,  and low body confidence
  • How the problem will be improved by the proposed policy and the high cost of eating disorders (health care/lost productivity) . It is also important to acknowledge that you do not expect to solve the entire problem with this one standalone policy, that this is a first step.

Unfortunately, we do not have a large number of national and local data sets on eating disorders, diet industry marketing, or digital distortion, which means we will need to use the most reliable and up-to-date data sets available. In addition to the great data you can get from STRIPED, you may want to consider additional research to gather local or state data that will support your campaign, such as:

• • Youth surveying youth: There is nothing more compelling to lawmakers than data about their community, collected by youth from their community, and explained to them by those same young people. Here’s an example of a youth survey and the results that were shared with lawmakers and the media in Massachusetts. Including questions about internet/social media influence in surveys should be considered. Below are some tools to get you started on developing a youth survey.
    • • Developing your own youth survey
      • Engaging youth in leadership roles when advocating for body confidence
  • Personal stories from people who have experience with your issue: First-person narratives are one of the most powerful forms of data in an advocacy campaign. Lawmakers represent people and if real people share their real stories of real need and real opportunities for change, lawmakers take notice. Personal stories also provide the important emotional content for the campaign. We will cover this a bit more in the Media Advocacy section but connecting on emotion rather than relying on intellect is a key to persuasion. We need to talk to the heart, not just the head!