Fruity Knowledge. Veggies Too.

Yes, this blog for four years has focused on political knowledge and especially the media's role in maintaining what people know.  Sometimes, though, you gotta go elsewhere for content, dipping into the obscure and the arcane.  Especially on slow news/academic days.

And that bring us to -- what Australians know about veggies and fruits.

Told ya.  Obscure.  Arcane.  According to this story:

A new survey of young Australians has found one in two don't know how many servings of fruit and vegetables to eat in a day, and even fewer know the serving sizes of common fruit and vegetables.

Yes, the survey of a whopping 106 college students found only 54 percent "knew the recommended daily amounts of fruit and vegetables."  This is the "first concrete evidence young Australians don't know their fruit and vegetable basics."

The boldface above, that's mine.  Concrete?  A survey of 106 college kids?  I'm not saying I don't believe the results, I'm saying the methodological problems in such a small, narrow sample are enough to make me want to skip my fruit and veggies for the day.  But there is some funny stuff here.  Read below.

Some participants estimated the serving size of grapes to be just one grape, and others estimated the serving size for carrots to be the equivalent of 20 carrots, when it is 20 grapes and half a medium-sized carrot (or half a cup of chopped carrot).

Wow.  I think we can all agree this qualifies as a major nutritional fail.  Again, I agree the results are probably accurate, that college kids are clueless on this, but the way they got there, with such a small (random?  hard to say) sample makes me wonder about just how "concrete" the results really are.

And thus ends our obscure, arcane, methodological moment.