Kids just wanna have fun: Children's experiences of a weight management programme

Abstract

Objectives To explore children's accounts of their experiences of the UK‘s largest childhood obesity programme, MEND (Mind, Exercise, Nutrition…Do it!) (See http://www.mendprogramme.org). Design Semi‐structured interviews were conducted with children who had completed the MEND obesity programme. Interviews were transcribed verbatim and analysed using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA). Method Fourteen children spanning diverse areas of London comprised this study (eight male, six female), aged between 11 and 14 years and in secondary school. Participants were interviewed a year after completing one of the London‐based MEND obesity programmes. Results This article focuses on the most common and striking theme to emerge from the original dataset (The complete analysis may be found in L. Watson, Unpublished doctoral thesis): Fun. Subthemes were: ‘going with the flow’; active participation in activities that led to new experiences (‘actually doing it’ – seeing the fun side); the importance of others in the experience of fun (‘you do games in unity’ – ‘it's not as fun on your own’). Conclusion Children have fun when engaged in interactive and varied activities with opportunity for individual feedback and improvement. When designing childhood obesity programmes, conditions that optimise children's experience of fun should be emphasised over didactic and risk‐heavy information pertaining to childhood obesity. What is already known on this subject? Continued growth in childhood obesity and its associated health problems, psychological effects, and economic burden make tackling childhood obesity a public health priority. Multicomponent lifestyle interventions to treat childhood obesity within the community have been shown to reduce overweight and obesity from pre‐ to post‐treatment, increase self‐esteem, and are found to be acceptable by parents. MEND is the most widely disseminated evidence‐based programme of this kind in the United Kingdom. What does this study add? This study is the first qualitative study to explore the child's experience of attending MEND. The post‐treatment maintenance period, where most behaviour change is consolidated (or not), is also captured in this study, with children interviewed at least 1 year post‐treatment. Findings unearthed an unexpected and strong theme – that of ‘fun’ – integral to their experience during their time at MEND. Optimizing conditions for fun is imperative to children's (and adults’?) engagement with, and maintenance of, healthy lifestyle activities.

The ‘Stages towards Completion Model’: what helps and hinders children with overweight or obesity and their parents to be guided towards, adhere to and complete a group lifestyle intervention

“…Our findings confirm other studies in which children voice the wish to integrate with peers and not be bullied anymore (Kelleher et al, 2017;Reece et al, 2015), as well as the desire to change (Watson, Baker, & Chadwick, 2016). One key theme arising from the children's perspective was the importance of having fun and a sense of belonging to the group while performing activities together, as has also been reported elsewhere (Sallinen et al, 2013;Watson et al, 2016).…”

Viewpoints of adolescents with overweight and obesity attending lifestyle obesity treatment interventions: a qualitative systematic review

“…Active engagement and fun have been highlighted in depth by Watson et al . , regarding exercise and classroom‐based learning of healthy eating. The importance of ensuring active engagement rather than passive is an important theme to recognize in intervention content.…”

“…Another avenue of support that appears to be valued highly by adolescents was their own family (8,31,33,34,36,37,39,40,43,(45)(46)(47)(48)(49)51). Family support gave adolescents continued motivation and encouragement to continue with their weight loss attempts (31).…”

“…Adolescents also valued support from their peers (8,31,33,34,(36)(37)(38)(39)(40)43,46,48,49,51,53,56,57). Adolescents described being around their peers as a security blanket, allowing them to feel comfortable and confident (34). This peer support gave adolescents with obesity a sense of belonging by allowing them to talk to adolescents in a similar position to them, sharing their struggles and issues.…”

Stakeholder’s views of adolescent weight management programmes: a qualitative study.

“…Once engaged, stakeholders recognised the need for the educational side of a programme to be practical and hands-on. This active engagement has been recognised elsewhere in a qualitative study of children's views of the MEND programme [18]. Additionally, the need to offer adolescents emotional and psychological support within a weight management programme, in addition to nutrition and physical activity education was noted.…”