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  3. The sharp fall in cigarette consumption in the US has led to steep declines in some negative health outcomes. But it has also, i

The sharp fall in cigarette consumption in the US has led to steep declines in some negative health outcomes. But it has also, i

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问题    The sharp fall in cigarette consumption in the US has led to steep declines in some negative health outcomes. But it has also, interestingly, coincided with another trend: the rise of obesity.
   "No one would recommend cigarette smoking as a way to combat obesity, " said Charles Baum, a professor of economics. He wondered what human behavior has played a role in the growing pervasiveness of obesity. So they tried to estimate how trivial things might have contributed. In order to approximate the effect of various socio-environmental factors, Baum used detailed data of three decades about the characteristics of over 12, 000 youths. They found that nothing seemed to have much effect at all except the changes in cigarette consumption.
   "The decline in the prevalence of cigarette smoking didn’t have a large effect, but it had an effect, " said Baum. "It can explain about as much as 4 percent of the increase in obesity." The impact associated with the fall in cigarette consumption was the largest of all the factors the researchers tested — such as the rise of urbanization and increase of restaurants — and that held true in all the three models they built to compare various factors.
   Cigarettes are a well-known appetite suppressant. There is much research that suggests nicotine tends to decrease food intake. The reasons include resultant changes to the nervous system, physical activity and preferences in food consumption. The effect is so significant that a study conducted in the early 1990s, which found that "major weight gain is strongly related to smoking cessation, " noted that it’s likely part of what makes it so hard for people to quit.
   The obesity epidemic is more likely the result of a complex web of many and varied societal shifts. There are things, of course, that contribute more than others. But there are also smaller, overlooked factors that slip through the cracks, evading the broader discussion. "Obviously, it’s hard to establish any causal relationship here, but I would definitely say that the fall in smoking probably contributed to the rise in obesity, " said Freedhoff, an obesity expert.
   What exactly are we supposed to learn from the suggestion that the fall in smoking might have contributed to the rise in obesity? The answer is that it’s better to view this finding as more of a point of interest, a takeaway that allows us to look at how societal changes move like waves that ripple, touching other shifts, even if only slightly.
One of Charles Baum’s findings is that the decline in cigarette consumption______.
选项 A、is accompanied by a decline in obesity
B、has contributed to the rise of obesity
C、has had no effect on the rate of obesity
D、was caused by the pervasive obesity
答案B
解析 第二段最后一句和第三段前两句说明只有吸烟率的变化似乎对肥胖率的上升有些影响，可以使肥胖率上升大约4％。
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