Psychological Status and Weight‐Related Distress in Overweight or At‐Risk‐for‐Overweight Children

Abstract

Research Methods and Procedures:We associated selfreport of depression, trait anxiety, and weight-related distress (body size dissatisfaction and weight-related peer teasing after controlling for the effects of weight) in 164 children (black 35%; age 11.9 Ϯ 2.5 years; girls 51%) who were overweight or at-high-risk-for-overweight and were not seeking weight loss. Results: Overall, heavier children reported more psychological and weight-related distress. Black children reported more anxiety and body size dissatisfaction than white children, despite equivalent weights. However, psychological distress was not significantly associated with weight in white children. Girls reported more weight-related distress than boys. Depression was associated with weight-related teasing in all predictive models, except in the model using only black subjects. Trait anxiety was associated with report of peer teasing when using all subjects. Depression was also significantly associated with children's report of body size dissatisfaction in models using all subjects, only girls, or white subjects, but not in analyses using only boys or black subjects. For boys peer teasing was associated with body size dissatisfaction. In models including only black children, depression and trait anxiety were not significantly associated with either report of peer teasing or body size dissatisfaction. Discussion: Regardless of race or sex, increasing weight is associated with emotional and weight-related distress in children. However, associations of psychological status, weight, and weight-related distress differ for girls and boys, and for black and white children.

The relation between weight-based teasing and psychological adjustment in adolescents

“…Similar to the American-based studies, we found that the experience of weight-based teasing is prevalent, especially among those who are overweight or obese. In both normal weight and overweight classifications, girls reported higher prevalences of weight-based teasing than boys -a sex difference that has been reported in American studies (7,8).…”

“…As expected, weight-based teasing occurs more often in overweight children and youth than in their normal weight peers (5)(6)(7)(8)(9). Much of the literature on weight-based teasing has shown untoward effects on body dissatisfaction, selfesteem and disordered eating, including bulimic eating behaviour (6,10,11).…”

“…YoungHyman et al (7) found that trait anxiety was associated with peer teasing. Trait anxiety is a more enduring form of anxiety that is characteristic of personality style, and is differentiated from state anxiety, which is more situation specific (ie, anxiety felt at a moment in time).…”

The Bidirectional Relationship Between Body Mass Index and Treatment Outcome in Adolescents with Treatment-Resistant Depression

“…This association might be explained by decreased physical activity, increased appetite associated with depression, or weight gain associated with side effects of medications used to treat depression (Stunkard et al 2003;Patten et al 2009;Hasnain et al 2012). Conversely, obesity may increase the risk for depression, possibly mediated by body shape dissatisfaction, peer or parental teasing, and decreased self-esteem, or because of incipient metabolic syndrome (Young-Hyman et al 2006;Libbey et al 2008;Wang et al 2009;Bang et al 2012;Hamer et al 2012;SanchezVillegas et al 2013). However, some longitudinal studies do not find that obesity predicts future depression (Gariepy et al 2010).…”

Maternal depression and socio-economic status moderate the parenting style/child obesity association

“…In the USA approximately one in six children between the ages of 2 and 19 years is obese and approximately one in three children is overweight (5) . A number of negative physical health consequences (6) and psychosocial consequences (7,8) of childhood overweight and obesity have been well documented. The urgency of this public health problem has led to revisions in terminology such that children with BMI-for-age $95th percentile are designated 'obese' and children with BMIfor-age $85th percentile but ,95th percentile are classified as 'overweight' (9) .…”