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Maternal depressive and anxiety symptoms, self-esteem, body dissatisfaction and preschooler obesity: a cross-sectional study

journal contribution
posted on 2016-01-01, 00:00 authored by Pree Benton, Helen Skouteris, Melissa HaydenMelissa Hayden
The primary aim of the present study was to cross-sectionally examine the associations between maternal psychosocial variables, child feeding practices, and preschooler body mass index z-score (BMI-z) in children (aged 2–4 years). A secondary aim was to examine differences in child weight outcomes between mothers scoring above and below specified cut-offs on the psychosocial measures. Two hundred and ninety mother–child dyads were recruited from Melbourne, Australia, and completed questionnaires examining demographic information, mothers’ depressive and anxiety symptoms, self-esteem and body dissatisfaction, restrictive and pressure child feeding practices, and preschoolers’ BMI-z scores. Independent t-tests and hierarchical multiple regression were employed to analyse the data. In the final regression model, none of the maternal psychosocial measures or feeding practices predicted child BMI-z scores; maternal body mass index and employment status were the only predictors of preschooler BMI-z. However, independent t-tests revealed that children of mothers with elevated body dissatisfaction scores had significantly higher BMI-z scores than children of mothers without elevated scores. The results suggest that psychosocial variables are not related, cross-sectionally, to preschooler weight outcomes; however, further research is needed to replicate the group differences noted between mothers with and without body dissatisfaction, and to track these relationships longitudinally.

History

Journal

Early child development and care

Volume

186

Issue

5

Pagination

799 - 814

Publisher

Taylor and Francis

Location

Abingdon, Eng.

ISSN

0300-4430

eISSN

1476-8275

Language

eng

Publication classification

C Journal article; C1 Refereed article in a scholarly journal

Copyright notice

2015, Taylor and Francis