Posted on 07/13/2007 5:41:18 AM PDT by Calpernia
A new study finds overweight kids are stigmatized by other children at a very early age, and they may even face bias from their own caregivers.
Rebecca Puhl, a clinical psychologist at the Center for Food Policy and Obesity says overweight children may become vulnerable targets of weight bias as early as age 3, "so it can be verbal teasing, it can be physical aggression and social rejection, and this is not something that is happening just from peers -it's also happening from parents and teachers."
She says "kids who are overweight and who are teased or victimized because of their weight are more vulnerable to things like depression, low self-esteem, poor body image and even suicidal thoughts and behaviors."
Puhl adds some youngsters respond to this victimization by "actually engaging in unhealthy eating behaviors like binge eating, and avoiding physical activity."
She says the bottom line is that "we need school systems to treat weight bias with the legitimacy of other forms of bias that are addressed in schools already, like gender and racial bias."
They had to do a study for that?!?
>>>BS, we need to treat child obesity as another form of child abuse.
Not by the CDC’s Body Mass Index.
http://www.cdc.gov/nccdphp/dnpa/bmi/
Look at the calculator. No field inputs for body type or sex.
It never ceases to amaze me what people will fund studies to find out.
I believe I read somewhere (probably FR) that that is already happening; I just don't know where to find it.
I’ve read that they recently determined that measuring BMI is only effective for the 25-55 age group, and even then it doesn’t account various issues, such as why a muscular athlete would be considered obese by its standards.
While there are other measuring methods out there such as the hip to waist ratio(the method they say is best for older folks) there really is nothing outside of a doctor’s visit as none of these measuring tests will consider present health as well.
One more thing...
While I am against schools regulating what snacks(come on, a bag of potato chips is probably healthier than the garbage they serve in most school cafeterias) I do think the parents of the kids need to take charge. If your kid is whining about being tired that he or she is fat, then make them do SOMETHING!! Don’t let them sit and moan and eat more. Turn the TV/computer off and send them for a bike ride, or go for a family walk and make sure there not snacking on junk and soda all afternoon.
bump
Whoops, at first glance I thought that said “fat face stigma”, and thought, “how cruel”. Pass the pizza.
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