Growing Up Today Study
The Growing Up Today Study (GUTS), established in the United States in 1996, follows over 26,000 children aged 9 to 14, in order to evaluate the factors that influence weight change. The participants are children of the women who took part in the second Nurses' Health Study, which assessed the risk factors for cancer and cardiovascular diseases. 16,882 children were enrolled in GUTS I, and 10,923 children were enrolled in GUTS II in 2004. Participants were initially surveyed on an annual basis until 2001, and have been surveyed biennially thereafter.[1]
Selected findings
- Girls who see thinness as important to their peers or who try to look like the women they see in TV, movies, and magazines are significantly more likely to exhibit bulimic tendencies (using laxatives or vomiting to control their weight).[2]
- Girls and boys who report spending more time with TV, videos, and videogames gain more weight.[3]
- Children who eat dinner with their families tend to have healthier diets which include more fruits and vegetables and less fried food and soda.[4]
- Children who perceive that their mother is frequently trying to lose weight are more likely to become highly concerned with their own weight or constantly diet.[5]
- Breastfeeding as an infant may lower the risk of being overweight during older childhood and adolescence.[6]
- Girls in the GUTS cohort were more likely to report using sunscreen than boys; they were also more likely to use tanning beds, and tanning bed use among girls in the cohort increased fivefold between the ages of 14 and 17.[7]
- Increasing physical activity during the winter is strongly associated with losing weight (decline in BMI) among overweight girls.[8]
- Dieting to control weight is ineffective for many adolescents and may actually promote weight gain.[9]
- Being born to a mother with gestational diabetes increases a child’s risk for adolescent obesity.[10]
- Drinking soda and other sugar-added beverages contributes to weight gain among adolescents.[11]
References
- ↑ Growing Up Today Study Website
- ↑ Field, AE; Camargo CA; Taylor CB; Berkey CS; Colditz GA (1999). "Relation of peer and media influences to the development of purging behaviors among preadolescent and adolescent girls". Arch Ped Adol Med 153: 1184–1189. doi:10.1001/archpedi.153.11.1184. PMID 1055572.
- ↑ Berkey, CS; Rockett HR; Field AE; Gillman MW; Frazier AL; Camargo CA; Colditz GA (2000). "Activity, dietary intake, and weight changes in a longitudinal study of preadolescent and adolescent boys and girls". Pediatrics 105 (4): e56. doi:10.1542/peds.105.4.e56. PMID 10742377.
- ↑ Gillman, MW; Rifas-Shiman SL; Frazier AL; Rockett HR; Camargo CA; Field AE; Berkey CS; Colditz GA (2000). "Family dinner and diet quality among older children and adolescents". Arch Fam Med. 9 3 (3): 235–40. PMID 10728109.
- ↑ Field, AE; Camargo CA; Taylor CB; Berkey CS; Roberts SB; Colditz GA (2001). "Peer, parent, and media influences on the development of weight concerns and frequent dieting among preadolescent and adolescent girls and boys". Pediatrics 107 (1): 54–60. doi:10.1542/peds.107.1.54. PMID 11134434.
- ↑ Gillman, MW; Rifas-Shiman SL; Camargo CA; Berkey CS; Frazier AL; Rockett HRH; Field AE; Colditz GA (2001). "Risk of overweight among adolescents who had been breast fed as infants". JAMA 285 (19): 2461–2467. doi:10.1001/jama.285.19.2461.
- ↑ Geller, AC; Colditz GA; Oliveria S; Emmons K; Jorgenson C; Aweh GN; Frazier AL (2002). "Use of sunscreen, sunburning rates, and tanning bed use among more than 10 000 US children and adolescents". Pediatrics 109 (6): 1009–1014. doi:10.1542/peds.109.6.1009. PMID 12042536.
- ↑ Berkey, CS; Rockett HR; Gillman MW; Colditz GA (2003). "One-year changes in activity and in inactivity among 10- to 15-year-old boys and girls: relationship to change in body mass index". Pediatrics 111 (4): 836–843. doi:10.1542/peds.111.4.836.
- ↑ Field, AE; Austin SB; Taylor CB; Malspeis S; Rosner B; Rockett HR; Gillman MW; Colditz GA (2003). "The relation between dieting and weight change among preadolescents and adolescents". Pediatrics 112 (4): 900–906. doi:10.1542/peds.112.4.900.
- ↑ Gillman, MW; Rifas-Shiman S; Berkey CS; Field AE; Colditz GA (2003). "Maternal diabetes, birth weight, and adolescent obesity". Pediatrics 111 (3): 221–226. doi:10.1542/peds.111.3.e221. PMID 12612275.
- ↑ Berkey, CS; Rockett HR; Field AE; Gillman MW; Colditz GA (2004). "Sugar-added beverages and adolescent weight change". Obesity Research 12 (5): 778–788. doi:10.1038/oby.2004.94. PMID 15166298.