Children's cognitive concepts of obesity: a developmental study.
Children's thoughts about human fatness were studied in interviews with children (n = 96) of three age groups (4-5 years, 8-9 years, and 12-13 years). Using a Piagetian theoretical framework, tasks were devised to measure concepts of body identity and causes of obesity which could be compared to measures of physical conservation and physical causality. Older children demonstrated higher levels of reasoning on all tasks than did younger children, with significant differences between each age group for each of four tasks (P less than 0.001). Correlations between tasks were high across all subjects but moderate within age groups. Body identity was understood at higher levels than was physical conservation (P less than 0.0001) among only the youngest group. The levels of understanding causes of fatness and of other natural physical events were not different in the youngest group. However, physical causality was understood and at a higher level than obesity causality among both the 8- to 9-year-olds (P less than 0.0001) and 12- to 13-year-olds (P less than 0.0001). Body identity and obesity causality scores were significantly different only among 12- to 13-year-olds at which time identity scores were higher (P less than 0.003). Physical causality was understood at higher levels than physical conservation among all age groups.
D000293:Adolescent; D001828:Body Image; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003071:Cognition; D006801:Humans; D009765:Obesity / Q000523:psychology*; D002666:Psychology, Child