Sunday, December 16, 2012

Television in the bedroom and increased body weight

Kids who spent more time watching TV are more likely to be overweight. This may be because if kids watch a lot of TV they sit too much, they may snack while watching TV, and/or they more exposed to marketing of unhealthy foods. It has been suggested that in order to reduce TV time, the opportunities for watching TV should be diminished: TV should become less accessible and available. In another study just published in the journal Pediatric Obesity, with Dr. Adrian Cameron as first author, we studied if 10-12 year old schoolchildren across Europe who have a TV in their bedroom are more likely to watch more TV, be overweight, and drink more soft drinks. This study was part of the ENERGY project. We found that almost 40% of schoolchildren had a bedroom television, with the highest percentage among Hungarian children (65%) and lowest for Belgian, Slovenian and Spanish children (all ≈28%). A television in the bedroom was positively associated with time spent watching television, soft drink consumption and overweight and obesity. The relationship between a television in the bedroom and measures of body size was partly mediated by total television viewing time but not by sleep duration, physical activity time or soft drink consumption.

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