Abstract
Objective. To investigate African-American and Hispanic mothers’ perceptions of their children's body size using a scale with child figure silhouettes and compare those perceptions with their children's actual body mass index. Methods. A set of child figure silhouettes was developed depicting 4 and 5 year-old African-American and Hispanic children. Body mass index was systematically estimated for each child figure on the set of silhouettes. Minority mothers with children enrolled in ten Head Start centers (n = 192) were interviewed using the silhouettes, and height and weight measurements were taken on their children. Head Start, a comprehensive child development program that serves children aged 3 to 5 years old, was chosen because of the large percentage of minorities, the low-income status of the families, and the age of the children. Results. Significant differences were found between mothers’ perceptions of their children's body size and the actual body size of the children. On average, mothers perceived their children to be thinner than their actual size. Furthermore, of those mothers with children at risk for overweight or overweight, two-thirds were either satisfied with their children's existing body size or wanted their children to be heavier. However, half of the mothers of children above the 95th percentile for BMI wanted their children to be thinner. Conclusions. These data suggest that minority mothers’ perceptions of their children's body size may not be consistently biased in one direction. Despite the possible social norm for a larger body size among low-income minorities, some mothers of overweight minority children do perceive their children to be too heavy when they reach a certain size.
This research was supported by funds from the United States Department of Agriculture, Environmental Influences on Children's Food Consumption Grant No. 2001-35200-10659. Partial support was received from Dairy Management Inc. This work is a publication of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA/ARS) Children's Nutrition Research Center, Department of Pediatrics, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, and has been funded in part with federal funds from the USDA/ARS under Cooperative Agreement No. 58-6250-6001. The contents of this publication do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the USDA, nor does mention of trade names, commercial products, or organizations imply endorsement from the U.S. government.
The authors wish to thank Sandra Lopez and Janet Bonner, who were instrumental in the development of the questionnaire, and for their help in data collection. We also thank Pamelia Harris for help in preparing the manuscript. We extend a special thanks to Nancy Butte and Ken Ellis for their help in estimating the BMI of each of the child silhouette figures.