Obesity prevention and prime time: An exploration of the television viewing habits of young children from low-income communities in New York City

Background: Early childhood obesity is of serious concern in the United States and across the world. In the U.S. 26.2% of children ages 2-5 are either overweight or obese; this percentage ranges from 24% of non-Hispanic black children to 32.6% of Mexican-American children. Television viewing has an effect on children's risk of becoming obese, likely mediated through a reduction in physical activity, an increase in unhealthful eating, and/or an increase in exposure to advertising of unhealthful foods. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommends zero television time for children under age 2 and 1-2 hours of educational media viewing for older children. Methods: A written, self-administered survey was given to parents of young children (ages 3-4) at 111 daycare centers in low-income neighborhoods in New York City. Parents were asked a number of questions about their and their child's television viewing practices at home. Results: Preliminary findings based on data from 93 sites (n=1,243) suggest that 1) Over one-third of the children (38%) watch more television than the AAP recommendation on the weekends; 2) an overwhelming majority (62.2%) have working televisions in their bedrooms; and 3) television viewing is associated with demographic characteristics including the language spoken at home and race/ethnicity. Discussion: The preliminary results from this study suggest that television watching is a problem among young children living in urban settings and, if confirmed in the full dataset, future work should be done to address these behaviors among children as young as three years of age.