Meat Consumption and the American Diet: Betsy Samber Presents her Thesis

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Would reducing meat consumption in the average American diet by fifty percent affect CO2 equivalent emissions or health concerns in the United States? Senior Betsy Samber answered this question in her senior thesis. Her concern with meat consumption in America began with her transition to veganism in her sophomore year and lead to her eventual exploration of the effects of meat consumption on health. She conducted an inductive quantitative meta-analysis that statistically analyzed four different data sets and distributed a survey on students’ awareness of the environmental and health effects of their food choices. Betsy found a very strong correlation between meat production and carbon dioxide equivalent emissions and said that, “[she] found that there was a really big lack of knowledge among students about their eating habits.” Her results are not just about animals, but about helping the Earth, too. She hopes to take this information and inform her peers about the consequences of meat consumption on the Earth and their health.