Association between parental feeding practices and later body mass index in children and adolescents: The Weight disorder survey of the CASPIAN-IV Study

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: Parental eating behavior and feeding practices have an important influence on child eating style and weight status. The aim of this study is to explore the association of parental feeding practices with later body mass index(BMI) in children and adolescents. METHODS: This cross-sectional nationwide study was conducted on 23183 Iranian students aged 6-18 years, living in 30 provinces of Iran. They were selected randomly through cluster sampling method. Trained interviewers gathered data on demographic, anthropometric and dietary behaviors related to weight disorders. The questions were about anorexia, overeating and parental pressure to eat, family history of chronic diseases, student's history on birth weight and breastfeeding duration, as well as the children and parents' body image. RESULTS: The mean (standard deviation, SD) of age was 12.53(3.31) years. Of 22841 participants, 50.7 were boys and 73.48 were from urban areas. We found significant association between gender, living area, birth weight, parental BMI, parental education, socio-economic status (SES), screen time, and student's weight in the one-way analysis. Students who had usually experienced forced eating were more underweight than other students (OR = 1.7, CI = 1.01-1.36, P = 0.03); moreover, they were significantly less obese (OR = 0.82, CI = 0.68-0.99, P = 0.04). Students who rarely had anorexia, were more overweight than those who never had anorexia(OR = 1.16, CI = 1.02-1.32, P = 0.02). The odds of being obese was lower among students who usually were forced to eat in recent months compared to those who had never experienced forced eating (OR = 0.76, CI = 0.61-0.96, P = 0.01). CONCLUSION: We found that parental feeding practices and parental perception of child weight might affect child weight status later in life. These results underscore the importance of focusing on the behaviors of both children and parents to prevent and/or treat unhealthy child weight.