Parent’s perception of child weight has larger impact than once thought

A collaboration between the University of Liverpool and Florida State University College of Medicine has recently taken place to determine the effect of parents perception of their children’s weight on subsequent weight gain. They found that parents whose children are overweight often fail to identify their offspring’s weight accurately . Little research has taken place before to examine whether parental perceptions of child weight status are protective against further weight gain.

By analysing the data of 3,557 Australian children and their parents, the researchers found that children whose parents perceived them as being overweight as opposed to being ‘about the right weight’, gained more weight following analysis. This showed that an identification of overweight by parents does not actually carry any protection for the child but instead it puts them at more risk of weight gain in the future. Further research is required to understand how parental perceptions of child weight may counter-intuitively contribute to obesity.