Children who have access to a television in their bedroom have a higher risk of overweight, according to results of a study published in the medical journal International Journal of Obesity.
Researchers at University College London in the UK conducted a large-scale study with 12,556 children using medical and environmental data provided by the Millennium Cohort Study (MCS), a multidisciplinary research project following more than 19,000 children born across the Channel in 2000 and 2001.
The results of the study showed that girls who had a television in their bedroom at age 7 had a 30% higher risk at age 11 of being obese compared to other children. For boys, this probability was increased by about 20%. The study took into account other factors related to obesity, such as household income, education of mothers, length of breastfeeding, physical activity and irregular hours of rest. In addition, theBMIof children at the age of 3 was included to minimize the possibility of reverse causation, “the possibility of being overweight in the first place leads to spending more time in front of a screen “.
Read also: Too much screen promotes obesity in teens
Obesity prevention: removing the television from the children’s room
“We found that television in the nursery was an independent risk factor for being overweight and for increased body mass in this nationally representative sample of children in the UK. “Childhood obesity should consider televisions in children’s rooms as a risk factor for obesity,” said Dr. Anja Heilmann, of UCL Institute of Epidemiology and Public Health and author of the study.
“THE’obesity childhood in the UK is a major public health problem. In England, about a third of every 11 year olds are overweight and one in five is obese. Our study shows that there is a clear link between having a television in the bedroom as a young child and being overweight a few years later ”.
Read also:
15% of obese adults in France
Children’s sleep linked to obesity
Childhood obesity: overweight mothers underestimate their child’s build
