Bedroom TVs increased weight gain risk for young adolescents

Looking beyond the effect of overall viewing time, having a television in an adolescent’s bedroom increased the likelihood of excess BMI, according to study data published in JAMA Pediatrics.

“Having a bedroom television is associated with weight gain beyond the effect of television viewing time. This association could be the result of uncaptured effects of television viewing or of disrupted sleep patterns. With the high prevalence of bedroom televisions, the effect attributable to this risk factor among US children and adolescents is excess weight of 8.7 million kg [per year],” Diane Gilbert-Diamond, ScD, of the department of community and family medicine, Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth in Lebanon, N.H, and colleagues wrote. “Given the pervasiveness of bedroom televisions and the epidemic prevalence of child obesity, this association may have a profound effect on the health of our children. This work underscores the need for interventional studies to explore whether removing televisions from child bedrooms results in lower adiposity gain.”

The researchers of the Dartmouth Media Study, an ongoing longitudinal study looking at US adolescents, conducted a random-digit prospective telephone survey. In this survey, 6,522 boys and girls aged 10 to 14 years at baseline (mean age, 12 years; 51.5% male) were surveyed about media risk factors for obesity. The researchers followed up at 2 and 4 years with age- and sex-adjusted BMI based on self- and parent reporting.

Of those surveyed, 59.1% of participants had televisions in their bedrooms at baseline; boys were 8% more likely than girls (P<.001) to have a television in the bedroom. This occurrence was more common among participants with lower parental educational level and family income (P<.001 for both). Adolescents with televisions in the bedroom also reported less demanding and responsive parents (P=.02 and P=.003, respectively).

After controlling for viewing time, video game playing, parenting, age, sex, race or ethnicity, household income and parental education level, having a bedroom television was associated with an excess BMI of 0.57 (95% CI, 0.31-0.82) and 0.75 (95% CI, 0.38-1.12) at years 2 and 4, respectively, and a BMI gain of 0.24 (95% CI, 0.02-0.45) from years 2 to 4.

Disclosure: This study was supported by grants from the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, the National Cancer Institute, Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, all part of the National Institutes of Health, as well as a grant from the Environmental Protection Agency.

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Source:

Gilbert-Diamond D. JAMA Pediatr. 2014;doi:10.1001/jamapediatrics.2013.3921.