besity was once considered a simple problem of energy balance. Theory suggested that overconsumption of food, any food, and a lack of physical activity, creates a positive energy balance that causes a slow but gradual accumulation of body fat. This is still widely believed by many individuals including many professionals in the health care industry. That this is false, is provable from the scientific literature, with many studies showing that obesity is a complex disease that results from both behavioural and physiological factors. In particular, studies show that poor quality diet is a primary cause of obesity, with fructose being particularly implicated in the development of the insulin and leptin resistance that characterise obesity. Any behaviour that increases the chance of consuming a low quality diet containing high intakes of sucrose, therefore increases the risk of developing obesity.
For example, one study1 investigated the association between parental work patterns and the rates of childhood obesity is families. The children were assessed at age 3 years, and their parents work patterns assessed by interview questionnaire. The results showed that of the children included in the study 23 % were overweight at 3 years. Maternal employment of any kind was associated with an increased risk of offspring being overweight at 3 years. Increasing weekly hours worked by 10 increased the risk of the child being overweight. Interestingly, this association was conditional on the income of the household being over £33,000, suggesting that poverty was not the cause of the association. The length of time the father of the child worked was not associated with the risk of being overweight. This may indicate that maternal attention is important for correct nutrition in infants.
These results are interesting because they suggest that parental behaviour has a strong influence on the risk of future obesity in the offspring. Long hours of work, with little regard to work life balance may therefore result in problematic nutritional habits in any children subjects to this lack of attention. The authors suggested that the absence of the mother may impede the access to healthy foods and result in the consumption of lower quality nutrition. This may be particularly true of convenience foods, which are usually considered to be of poor nutritional quality. The lack of time to cook adequate food using whole ingredients, and provide a sound nutritional plan to the child because of work commitment may therefore be the reason for this association. That the household income was assessed in these families was a good inclusion to the study because it allowed confirmation that the risk of obesity was not due to poverty.
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