NEW YORK - Children's tendency to become overweight might have something to
do with how their mothers urge them to eat, a new study hints.
It showed that obese moms are no more likely than normal-weight mothers to
prompt their children to eat, but the children of obese mothers are more likely
to respond to these prompts.
It's possible that children of obese mothers may be more responsive to
environmental cues to eat, or the cues from obese mothers could somehow be
different from those given by normal-weight moms, Dr. Julie C. Lumeng and Lori
M. Burke of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor write in the Journal of
Pediatrics.
Maternal restriction of a child's eating has been tied to a greater risk of
obesity in girls, the researchers note, but there has been less research on how
a mother's urging a child to eat might influence weight.
To investigate links between maternal prompting and child compliance, as well
as child and parent weight, Lumeng and Burke watched 71 mother-child pairs try
four different foods, including two familiar foods (Twinkies and potato chips)
and two unfamiliar foods (a Chinese moon cake and fried vegetable chips). Just
over one-third of the mothers were obese, while about one in eight of the
children were.
There was no difference in how frequently obese or non-obese mothers prompted
the child to eat a particular food, the researchers found. However, kids with
obese moms complied with their mother's prompts 70 percent of the time, compared
to 60 percent of children of normal-weight women.
For unfamiliar foods, the difference was somewhat more pronounced, with 67
percent of children of obese mothers trying these foods when prompted, compared
to 52 percent of children of normal-weight mothers.
Obese mothers with heavier children were more likely to prompt them to eat
the novel foods, and less likely to urge them to eat the familiar foods. It's
possible they saw the familiar food as "junk food," the investigators note,
while perceiving the unfamiliar foods as more nutritious.
"Just as restrictive and controlling maternal feeding practices may
contribute to obesity risk, so may prompting, particularly in children of obese
mothers," Lumeng and Burke conclude.
SOURCE: The Journal of Pediatrics, September 2006.
