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Parental Misperception of Children's Obesity in Mississippi
Methods: Data are from multi-year (2008-2012) annual studies conducted among randomized samples of parents (N=14,808) to evaluate the effectiveness of the Mississippi Healthy Students Act of 2007. Slightly more non-Hispanic whites (54%) than African Americans (46%) participated in the study. We conducted descriptive analyses (i.e., frequencies, cross tabulations, and correlations) to examine our variables of interest. Results presented here focus on parental misperceptions of childhood overweight/obesity.
Results: Although 77.5% of parents categorized their child as having a healthy weight, only 54.5% of children actually fell into the BMI-based “healthy weight” category based on self-reported height and weight data provided by parents. The greatest difference between parental misperceptions and BMI results occurred among very young children. Even though 71.7% of parents categorized their kindergartners as having a healthy weight, BMI results indicated that only 28.3% were actually at a healthy weight.
Conclusions: Understanding parental misperceptions of childhood overweight/obesity is an important component of unlocking the multi-dimensional components of childhood obesity. These results reinforce the important educational role that health care providers play in communicating with parents regarding childhood overweight/obesity, particularly among parents of very young children.
Learning Areas:
Advocacy for health and health educationConduct evaluation related to programs, research, and other areas of practice
Planning of health education strategies, interventions, and programs
Social and behavioral sciences
Learning Objectives:
Describe parental misperceptions of weight status of their children; Examine findings from five-year study (2008-2012) from over 14,000 children; Discuss predictive variables of parent perceptions of childhood obesity and public health implications.
Keyword(s): Obesity, Child Health Promotion
Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I have conducted research on the social determinants of health among minority and vulnerable populations for nearly 10 years -- with a particular focus on childhood overweight and obesity prevention, physical fitness, health education, and program evaluation. My publications have appeared in journals such as the Journal of School Health, Journal of Health Disparities Research & Practice, and Journal of the Mississippi State Medical Association.
Any relevant financial relationships? No
I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.