Like Father, Like Son. Physical Activity, Dietary Intake, and Media Consumption in Pre-School-Aged Children

Abstract

An imbalance between energy input and energy needs contributes to the growing incidence of overweight children. Pre-schoolers normally like to move, but even at this young age, they are already affected by a lack of physical activity and a high amount of screen time. Media consumption contributes to unhealthy diets and extends the length of time spent sitting. Longer periods of sitting are, independent of the level of activity, seen as a risk factor for the development of obesity. In the present study, 160 pre-schoolers and their parents (128 mothers, 121 fathers) were examined. The results show deviations from actual recommendations regarding physical activity, time spent sitting, dietary intake, and media consumption. Increased screen time was associated with a higher weight status among pre-school-aged children. To provide a healthy upbringing, prevention and intervention measures should be implemented on a behavioral and relational level.

Measurement of screen time among young children aged 0–6 years: A systematic review

“…To improve the quality of psychometrics reporting and advance our understanding of the potential harms and benefits of screen time in young children, manuscripts should include adequate reporting of measures used to assess screen time. This includes details of the items T A B L E 1 Descriptive characteristics of articles that included a measure of screen time among young children aged 0-6 years -190, 192-194, 196, 197, 201, 202, 206 175,177,184,189,191,192,194,196,198,200,202,204,207 190, 192-194, 197, 198, 200-203, 206 Just as the range of devices assessed has expanded, there are appeals to move beyond measurement of duration of screen time to include measures of quality of screen use, 15 namely, the content viewed and the context in which screens are being used. 650 The AAP emphasizes the importance of adult interaction during media use, particularly for children under the age of 2 years, that is, the parent watching with the child and reteaching the content.…”

Physical Activity and Sedentary Behaviors of Young Children: Trends from 2009 to 2018

“…Parents' responses were given in hours and minutes. This question has been used for children's ST assessment in several studies [7,[49][50][51] and presented acceptable test-retest reliability (intraclass correlation = 0.68, 95% CI = 0.52-0.83) [49].…”

Intervention effects of a kindergarten-based health promotion programme on obesity related behavioural outcomes and BMI percentiles

“…Madigan et al, 2019), this also means children could spend 1 h per day more being physically active. Since parents play a major role in their children's screen media use (Frate et al, 2019), “Join the Healthy Boat” tried to tackle increased time with screen media informing parents about guidelines, the establishment of family media rules and action alternatives to reduce time in front of screens. However, maybe at kindergarten such an intervention is too late already, as screen media habits might have established already.…”

“…Although there was a slight tendency towards an increased fruit and vegetable consumption at follow-up, this could be detected in both groups. Again, this aspect is very much reliant on parental participation, since the parents are responsible for their children's food (choices) (Frate et al, 2019). The intervention included 15 dietary lessons within the year, including cooking, healthy snacks and breakfast, which were all documented and transported home via either recipes booklets or posters in their kindergartens.…”