Obesity, appearance, and psychosocial adaptation in young African American children.
OBJECTIVE
To evaluate the contributions of weight status, skin tone, peer teasing, and parental appraisals of child's size to self-esteem and psychosocial adjustment in overweight African American children.


METHODS
Overweight to very obese 5- to 10-year-old African American children (N = 117) completed measures of self-esteem, skin tone satisfaction, peer teasing, and body size perception. Caregivers completed the Child Behavior Checklist and rated their child's body size.


RESULTS
Overweight was associated with low appearance self-esteem, and body size dissatisfaction with low global self-worth and low appearance self-esteem in children 8 and older. Appearance self-esteem but not global self-worth was lower in girls than boys. Parental perception of child's size as heavier than average was associated with low child appearance self-esteem. Heavier children also had more parental report of behavior and psychosocial problems, but their scores were in the nonclinical range. Child skin tone dissatisfaction was associated with low global self-worth. Weight-related peer teasing was associated with low self-esteem.


CONCLUSIONS
The relationship between obesity and self-esteem in African American children depends upon age, gender, and children's experiences with teasing and parental evaluation of their size. Other factors, like skin tone satisfaction, contribute to a child's sense of self-worth.
Young-Hyman
Deborah
D
University of Maryland Medical School, MD, USA.
Schlundt
David G
DG
Herman-Wenderoth
Leanna
L
Bozylinski
Khristine
K
D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D001741:Black or African American / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D001828:Body Image; D015992:Body Mass Index; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009765:Obesity / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000208:ethnology*; D012649:Self Concept; D014481:United States / Q000453:epidemiology