No abstract

Infants who were fed breast milk more than infant formula, or who were breastfed for longer periods, had a lower risk of being overweight during older childhood and adolescence.

BERKEY, CATHERINE S., HELAINE R.H. ROCKETT, ALISON E. FIELD, MATTHEW W. GILLMAN, AND GRAHAM A. COLDITZ. Sugar-added beverages and adolescent weight change. Obes Res. 2004;12:778 -788. Objective: The increase in consumption of sugar-added beverages over recent decades may be partly responsible for the obesity epidemic among U.S. adolescents. Our aim was to evaluate the relationship between BMI changes and intakes of sugar-added beverages, milk, fruit juices, and diet soda. Research Methods and Procedures: Our prospective cohort study included Ͼ10,000 boys and girls participating in the U.S. Growing Up Today Study. The participants were 9 to 14 years old in 1996 and completed questionnaires in 1996, 1997, and 1998. We analyzed change in BMI (kilograms per meter squared) over two 1-year periods among children who completed annual food frequency questionnaires assessing typical past year intakes. We studied beverage intakes during the year corresponding to each BMI change, and in separate models, we studied 1-year changes in beverage intakes, adjusting for prior year intakes. Models included all beverages simultaneously; further models adjusted for total energy intake. Results: Consumption of sugar-added beverages was associated with small BMI gains during the corresponding year Analyses of year-to-year change in beverage intakes provided generally similar findings; boys who increased consumption of sugar-added beverages from the prior year experienced weight gain (ϩ0.04 kg/m 2 per additional daily serving, p ϭ 0.01). Children who increased intakes by 2 or more servings/d from the prior year gained weight (boys: ϩ0.14, p ϭ 0.01; girls ϩ0.10, p ϭ 0.046). Further adjusting our models for total energy intake substantially reduced the estimated effects, which were no longer significant. Discussion: Consumption of sugar-added beverages may contribute to weight gain among adolescents, probably due to their contribution to total energy intake, because adjustment for calories greatly attenuated the estimated associations.

ABSTRACT. Objective. To assess whether dieting to control weight was associated with weight change among children and adolescents.Methods. A prospective study was conducted of 8203 girls and 6769 boys who were 9 to 14 years of age in 1996, were in an ongoing cohort study, and completed at least 2 annual questionnaires between 1996 and 1999. Dieting to control weight, binge eating, and dietary intake were assessed annually from 1996 through 1998 with instruments designed specifically for children and adolescents. The outcome measure was age-and sex-specific z score of body mass index (BMI).Results. In 1996, 25.0% of the girls and 13.8% of the boys were infrequent dieters and 4.5% of the girls and 2.2% of the boys were frequent dieters. Among the girls, the percentage of dieters increased over the following 2 years. Binge eating was more common among the girls, but in both sexes, it was associated with dieting to control weight (girls: infrequent dieters, odds ratio [OR]: 5.10; frequent dieters, OR: 12.4; boys: infrequent dieters, OR: 3.49; frequent dieters, OR: 7.30). During 3 years of follow-up, dieters gained more weight than nondieters. Among the girls, frequency of dieting was positively associated with increases in age-and sex-specific z scores of BMI (␤ ‫؍‬ 0.05 and ␤ ‫؍‬ 0.04 for frequent and infrequent dieters vs nondieters). Among the boys, both frequent and infrequent dieters gained 0.07 z scores of BMI more than nondieters. In addition, boys who engaged in binge eating gained significantly more weight than nondieters.Conclusions. Although medically supervised weight control may be beneficial for overweight youths, our data suggest that for many adolescents, dieting to control weight is not only ineffective, it may actually promote weight gain.