Is your child headed for obesity? Here’s some advice your grandmother might have given you — chances are slimmer that your kids will be fat if they eat meals at home, don’t watch too much TV, and get lots of sleep.
Researchers in Ohio analyzed data on thousands of four-year-old children to find out whether some good, old-fashioned household habits were associated with lower risk for obesity. And the results were quite dramatic.
“Children living in households where they regularly ate dinner as a family, got enough sleep at night, and were limited in their daily TV viewing were 40 per cent less likely to be obese compared to children who had none of these household routines,” said Dr. Sarah Anderson (PhD), assistant professor of epidemiology at Ohio State University and lead author of the study.
Each of the routines had been linked in previous studies to lower obesity, but this was the first time researchers had studied such a large group of children to assess the benefit of using all three routines.
“Each of these household routines by themselves was associated with lower risk for obesity, and the more of them children had, the better,” said Anderson.
The study involved a national sample of about 8,550 four-year-old children enrolled in the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study in the U.S. Eighteen per cent of the children were obese.
Although every family and every child is different in terms of what’s needed, there are a few targets to aim for. “We saw a lower risk of obesity associated with 10 and a half hours of sleep each night, two hours maximum of screen-viewing time per day, and family meals more than five times per week,” said Anderson.
Screen time includes time spent watching videos and DVDs.
Establishing these routines probably has other benefits to children’s development, such as emotional stability.
“Families with young children may want to consider what it would take for them to have these routines for their child,” she said.
The study is scheduled for publication in the March issue of the journal Pediatrics. Anderson’s co-author was Robert Whitaker, professor of public health and pediatrics at Temple University.
