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Vitamins are organic substances of which small quantities are necessary for normal health and growth in higher forms of animal life. Vitamins are distinct from many other compounds indispensable for animal function in that they cannot be synthesized by the animal in adequate quantities. In the absence of a particular vitamin from the animal's diet, a specific deficiency disease may develop.
Metaphor
Individuals and specialized groups experience difficulty in functioning in isolation using only the information they generate themselves. Such groups are dependent upon minimal amounts of different types of information of external origin. In the absence of a particular type of such information from the group's 'information diet', the group may develop a specific kind of dysfunction.
[Features]The limited range of vitamins and their specific function in maintaining the health of the animal.
[Contrast]In the case of both an individual and a group, unrelieved routine is recognized to be unhealthy for development. Importance is attached to challenges and external stimuli. The media are concerned to provide a balanced information diet (news, sport, adventure, romance, music, sex, documentary, how-to-do-it, scandal, who-done-it, religious celebration, etc). There is however little explicit awareness of what basic categories of information make up that diet and which of those kinds the group is unable to generate for itself.
[Keys]Sensory deprivation. Types of vitamin and their metabolic function. A balanced diet. Variation in vitamin requirements of different animal species.