This Article  • Full text  • PDF  • Send to a friend  • Save in My Folder  • Save to citation manager  • Permissions  Citing Articles  • Citation map  • Citing articles on HighWire  • Citing articles on ISI (3)  • Contact me when this article is cited  Related Content  • Similar articles in this journal  Topic Collections  • Nutritional and Metabolic Disorders  • Nutrition/ Malnutrition  • Patient-Physician Relationship, Other  • Pediatrics, Other  • Randomized Controlled Trial  • Alert me on articles by topic  Social Bookmarking   What's this?

Susanna Saarilehto, MPsych; Helena Lapinleimu, MD, PhD; Soili Keskinen, DPsych; Hans Helenius, MSc; Olli Simell, MD, PhD

Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 2003;157:753-758.

Objective  To investigate whether dietary counseling designed for primary prevention of atherosclerosis and given repeatedly since infancy had an effect on prepubertal children's body satisfaction.

Design  Randomized controlled trial.

Participants  At the age of 7 months, 1062 infants were randomized to an intervention group (n = 540) or a control group (n = 522). At the age of 8 years, body satisfaction of 217 children in the intervention group and 218 in the control group was evaluated.

Intervention  Since the children were 8 months old, families in the intervention group had regularly received individualized health education and dietary advice aimed at decreasing the children's intake of saturated fat and cholesterol.

Main Outcome Measures  A pictorial instrument was used in measuring estimated current and desired body sizes; a difference between the 2 indicated body dissatisfaction. Weight and height were measured.

Results  When adjusted for relative weight, there were no differences in the mean values of estimated current size, desired size, or body dissatisfaction between the girls in the intervention and control groups (P = .62, P = .72, and P = .39, respectively), or between the boys in the intervention and control groups (P = .21, P = .64, and P = .53, respectively). The proportions of children who were satisfied with their size, who wished to be thinner, or who wished to look heavier did not differ between the intervention and control groups in either girls (P = .65) or boys (P = .85).

Conclusion  Long-term, individualized dietary counseling since infancy with the focus on dietary fat did not enhance body dissatisfaction or desire to be thinner in 8-year-old children.

From the Research Centre of Applied and Preventive Cardiovascular Medicine (Ms Saarilehto) and Departments of Pediatrics (Drs Lapinleimu and Simell), Teacher Training in Rauma (Dr Keskinen), and Biostatistics (Mr Helenius), University of Turku, Turku, Finland.

CiteULike    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati     What's this?

THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES

Weight Gain Since Infancy and Prepubertal Body Dissatisfaction
Angle et al.
Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med 2005;159:567-571.
ABSTRACT | FULL TEXT