Consuming More than Just Stories: Does What Children Watch on TV While Eating Influence how Much they Eat?

摘要

Television (TV) viewing is a risk factor for obesity in children. This is partly due to its promotion of energyintake by distracting from normal satiety signals. Children are exposed to a variety of TV programs which differ infeatures such as pacing. This is reason to believe that different children’s TV shows distract to varying degrees, and cantherefore influence energy intake to different extents. We suggest that future research should examine how different TVshows influence energy intake in children. Such research could help identify new ways to protect children from thenegative effects of TV viewing on caloric intake and ultimately body weight.