Study Unveils the Role of Feeding Practices in Infant's Rapid Weight Gain
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A UNC Greensboro (UNCG) study following 299 women and their infants from pregnancy to toddlerhood examined multiple psychological, biological, and social factors in the context of infants’ rapid weight gain. They found infant feeding practices associated with obesity, known as obesogenic practices, are strongly correlated with rapid infant weight gain.
Examples of obesogenic practices described in their recent Pediatric Obesity paper include watching television while feeding a baby, formula feeding, and supplementing a bottle with additional foods.
“The key take home point is that what and how parents feed their infants in the first 6 months of life has tremendous implications for obesity risk, and childbearing parents who experience more stress during the prenatal period are particularly likely to engage in these unhealthy pratices,” says Dr. Esther Leerkes, a UNCG professor in human development and family studies, who served as lead author on the paper. Infants who gain weight rapidly before the age of two are at a higher risk for obesity.
Researchers recruited 299 pregnant women and measured their physical and psychological health, known as prenatal psychobiological risk. Strengths of their sample include the diverse backgrounds and socioeconomic statuses of participants: 29.4% identified as Black, 6.7% as multiracial, and 7.7% as Hispanic or Latino.
Once participants gave birth, researchers assessed caregivers’ attunement to infant needs, infant temperament and stress level, and obesogenic feeding practice at set intervals. The researchers discovered obesogenic feeding practices strongly and significantly correlated with infant rapid weight gain, and that mothers’ prenatal psychological risk increased the likelihood they would engage in obesogenic feeding.
Although Leerkes says breastfeeding is recommended to decrease obesity risk, some parents may not have this option due to many constraints, physical limitations, or other systemic level barriers.
Reference: Leerkes EM, Buehler C, Wideman L, Chen Y, Shriver LH. Biopsychosocial predictors of rapid weight gain from birth to 6 months. Pediatric Obesity. 2024;e13170. doi:10.1111/ijpo.13170
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