Discuss Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children
Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
Childhood obesity is a complicated topic and is complicated to pinpoint what the exact cause is, some of the major factors that contribute to childhood obesity are lack of exercise in their daily lives, poor nutrition, and eating habits; and lack of education among parents to safely help their children live a healthier life. Childhood obesity poses a serious threat to the health of our nation, children these days have little to none outdoors activities. Lack of physical activity found to be a significant factor in contributing to childhood obesity. It is very probable that the only outdoors activity that children have now is a P.E. class at school if the school offers it. Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
They also spend a considerable amount of time talking on the phone to friends or reading books”. Therefore these type of activities replace any physical activity that children can participate in. The lack of exercise doesn’t just affect their internal being but it also affects their external being as well. Lack of exercise can cause serious health issues. Our children have been greatly affected by lack of exercise. Among all effects of lack of exercise, obesity is primary. Because of the lack of exercise in children, child hood obesity has increased and will continue to increase as time goes by. Children and adolescents who are obese are at greater risk for bone and joint problems, sleep apnea, and social and psychological problems such poor self-esteem and also more serious problem like diabetes and cardiovascular diseases a very early age. The article states, “The high prevalence of teasing by family members, peers and teachers requires education on the mistreatment of obese children. There is a need to protect the psychosocial and physical well-being of obese children”. Obese children are often teased because of their weight causing them to get depressed and sometimes they cope with this by eating unhealthy but comforting types of food. The need has never been greater to support healthy eating Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
Childhood obesity has become a public health concern in recent years. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that approximately 12.5 million children and adolescents are obese. This number accounts for approximately 17% of children and adolescents between the ages of 2 and 19 in the United States. Worse, it estimates that the obesity rate among children and adolescents has tripled since 1980.
Many factors likely play a role in the trend for increasing childhood obesity in the United States. These factors include the consumption of fast food and soft drinks, lack of physical activity, and increased time spent watching television or playing video games.
While preaching better nutrition and physical activity to kids is essential, that message will likely prove far more effective if parents serve as better examples of good health.
What can parents do to lead healthy lifestyles and demonstrate those lifestyle behaviors to their children?Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
Teach better nutrition
Not only should kids eat healthier foods and drink healthier beverages, they should also learn to make better nutritional choices themselves. Getting rid of junk food and soft drinks can be good start for a healthier family, but children should learn how to choose healthier foods and beverages.
One idea that parents can consider for instilling proper nutrition involves taking the kids to the grocery store. Walk up and down the aisles and teach them why certain foods are more nutritious than others. Then allow them to select some of the foods and drinks themselves, perhaps for a family meal. If they can bring their own lunches to school, allow them to choose foods for their daily lunches.
By teaching nutrition at an early age, it’s more likely these youth will make healthier food choices as they get older and more independent.Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
Limit screen time
The amount of time that kids spend staring at a screen is staggering. When parents consider how much time their children perform these activities, they need to consider how often their kids spend time watching TV, using computers, playing video games, watching movies, or looking at cell phones.
Studies show that kids between the ages of 8 and 18 watch television for an average of 4.5 hours per day. When other forms of screen time are included, this average jumps to 7.5 hours per day.Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
This screen time can increase the chances that a child becomes obese. Kids are likely to snack, especially on junk food, while watching TV. Also, these young kids will likely see hundreds of advertisements for unhealthy foods and beverages during the television programs. More importantly, some of that 7.5 hours could be spent engaging in regular physical activity.
The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that parents limit their children’s total media consumption to no more than one to two hours per day. While this guideline is critical for children and adolescents to follow, parents should use it as well. It is hard to preach limits on screen time if the parents come home and watch TV too.
Engage the family in physical activity
The 2008 Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans recommends that children and adolescents perform at least 60 minutes of physical activity each day. Parents can play a large role in helping their kids achieve these daily recommendations by engaging them in fun activities involving physical exertion. Jogging, walking, taking bike rides, hiking, and many other activities can be both fun and physically beneficial. To keep the kids enthusiastic about exercise, allowing them to bring their friends or encourage them to pick the activities.Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
If children see their parents exercising regularly, they are also more likely to accept it as a normal part of their own lives. They might look forward to exercising rather than perceiving it as some sort of punishment.
If parents commit to becoming healthier themselves – making better nutrition choices and performing regular physical activity – their children are much more liekly to emulate these behaviors.
Creating a positive eating environment
Family meals take place in the home (or the “eating environment”). This eating environment can have a positive or negative impact on your children’s eating habits. Here are a few tips to help you create a positive eating environment for your children.Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
Have regular meal and snack times
Having regular meal and snack times everyday creates a healthy routine. If your children eat whenever they feel like it, they may not be hungry when it’s time for a scheduled meal or snack. They may also overeat during the day.
Eat together as a family
Children who eat meals with their family tend to eat healthier foods like fruits, vegetables and whole grains. They are also at lower risk for becoming overweight. However, children who eat in front of the TV tend to make poorer food choices. Eating meals in front of the TV should be avoided as this can lead to overeating and a higher risk of childhood obesity. Learn more about why it is important to eat together without TV.Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
Avoid pressuring your children to eat
Insisting that your children eat certain foods may actually cause them to eat less. As a parent, you are responsible for providing healthy food choices to your children. Your children should be allowed to decide how much to eat based on how hungry they feel. Are mealtimes a struggle? Say goodbye to picky eating with these tips.
Avoid using food as a reward or punishment
Eating is a way to nourish our bodies. Using food as a reward or punishment may lead to unhealthy eating habits. Offer a variety of healthy foods and let your children serve themselves without any pressure.
Have healthy foods at home
Make sure to buy healthy foods when you shop. The foods available in your fridge, freezer, cupboards and pantry are what your children will get used to eating. Use this menu planning form to help you plan healthy meals as a family!
Being a positive role model
Parents can influence their children’s eating habits in a positive way by being a good role model. Here are some tips on how to be a good role model when it comes to food.
Make healthy foods the usual choice
What you eat sets an example for what your children will eat. Enjoy foods from the four Food Groups in Canada’s Food Guide every day such as vegetables, fruit, whole grain products, low fat dairy products, lean meats, legumes, eggs and fish. When your children see you eating these foods, they are more likely to want to eat them too. Check out these videos on how to make quick and easy breakfasts, lunches and snacks.Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
Limit foods high in calories, fat, sugar and salt
Foods that are high in calories, fat, sugar and salt like cakes, chocolate, cookies, doughnuts, ice cream, French fries, potato chips, pop, sports and energy drinks, and sweetened hot or cold drinks should be eaten less often. When you limit these foods yourself, your children will be less likely to eat them as well. It is important not to label these foods as “bad”. They are simply foods to be eaten occasionally and in moderation.
The bottom line
As a parent, you have an important role in shaping your children’s eating habits. By creating a positive eating environment and being a good role model, you can help your children develop healthy eating habits that can make a lasting impact on their health.
Eating is no different, and the way parents talk about food, cook meals and eat are the most important influence of developing healthy eating habits on a child. Children watch and imitate adults and look to them to learn everything from saying please and thank-you to fitness and nutrition behavior.Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
Children can also pick up on their parents’ attitudes about food. As role models, parents need to make sure they’re demonstrating a healthy attitude toward food so their children do, too.
Teaching Healthy Habits at Mealtime
Dad and Son BreakfastResearch shows that family mealtimes have a big impact on how children eat as they grow into adulthood and start making food choices of their own. One study showed that children who eat meals with their parents tend to eat more fruit, vegetables and dairy products than children who don’t share meals with their families1.
Eating meals as a family is key to raising high-achieving, healthy and well-adjusted children. Family meals have been shown to improve academic achievement and self-esteem. Eating together also leads to more interest in nutrition: Silva found that teenagers tended to eat more “fun” foods with their friends, but looked forward to eating a more healthful evening meal with their families. Another study from 2007 found that kids who ate with their families had healthier overall diets than those who did not. As a result, these kids also tended to have a lower prevalence of overweight, too2.Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
Cooking family meals with your children can also be fun and educational and spark a life-long interest in cooking. One study demonstrated that cooking together also helped kid know how to make a “balanced” meal.
Model Healthy Eating
Kids will continue picking up your eating habits as they become teenagers, and will use the skills you teach them throughout their lives.
Mom and Daughter PicnicRole-modeling bad behavior can have an effect, too. One study found that the children of mothers who skipped breakfast and ate few fruits, vegetables and dairy foods, had low-quality diets3.Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
Try to avoid restricting foods or labeling them “good” or “bad” as doing so may actually increase your child’s desire for these foods when you’re not there to restrict them. A study found that when mothers restricted certain foods, their children (especially daughters) tended to overeat those foods when given a chance4.
Always maintain a healthy attitude toward food. Enjoy what you eat and let your kids know it’s okay to eat all foods in moderation.
While it’s unrealistic to expect any parent to be a perfect role model, try your best to demonstrate good eating habits and it will positively impact your child.
The Relationship between Family Systems and Healthy Development
I liked the video presentation by Victor Henson he liked a family system to homeostasis. This was a great analogy to use because if a family does not abide by the rules in place this will break down the family structure. I feel that if a family is a structure in which each person has a role to play and rules to respect and with those rules they are expected to react in a certain as determined by their role within the family. I feel in a family that should work together within the limitations of the family system. When a family interacts as a unit when there is a leader that by setting and following rules, consistency, loving and supportive it makes for a healthy family. When the rule structure is broken, then it makes way for bad things to happen within the unit. Victor Henson used the term equilibrium therefore breaking the strong family organization. Deuteronomy 6:4-9 Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates (NIV, 2011). This scripture resonates to me a good healthy family when they place the word within their family structure.Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
How can one discern a healthy family system?
No one is perfect and you will find some bickering and tension and bad emotions toward one another, but not all the time. In a healthy family you can see that emotional expression is allowed and accepted and they work through it. Attention is given freely and equally. The rules they are to follow are staple and consistent, but do allow for flexibility or compromise for adaptation for individual needs. Watching a healthy family you can see that each member will have their own individuality and it is respected and they are encouraged to pursue his or her own interests and the boundaries within the family are respected and honored. The parent’s role and the children roles are apparent in a healthy family the parents are not treating the child as an adult and healthy families I have seen where a healthy family allow mistakes will be made and mistakes are acceptable because no one is perfect. Healthy families rejoice in one another spending time together and loving one another unconditionally.Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
The prevalence of childhood obesity has increased considerably during the past 20 years, creating concern for the future health and well-being of millions of children worldwide.1,2 Strategies to help overcome what has come to be known as “the obesity epidemic” remain challenging, given the vulnerability of children and the complex nature of their environment. A child’s early environment, although seemingly limited, is comprised primarily of the family. The family remains an influential force even as the child’s environment expands to include peers and school while the child matures.3 Within the family, parents are key members who influence a child’s behavior. They do so by carrying out their role through parenting. Parenting refers to activities enacted by parents when interacting with their child to facilitate physical, social-emotional, and behavioral health and well-being throughout the child’s lifespan.4 The role that parents play in the development of their child’s healthy behaviors, particularly those related to eating and activity, is critical. In turn, children rely on their parents to structure their environment and promote healthy choices that sustain energy balance and weight throughout childhood into adulthood. Given the role that parents play in the development of eating and activity behaviors, it is not surprising that parents have been referred to as agents of change.5,6 Consequently, parental roles require careful consideration in the prevention and treatment of childhood obesity.Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
Parental activities vary according to the age and needs of the child and are influenced by the context of the environment, both within and outside the family. Factors such as socioeconomic status (SES) and ethnicity contribute to the complexity of the interaction between parents and children. Additionally, the incidence of obesity and the risk of becoming obese has become a global concern crossing all incomes and ethnicities at various rates. Moreover, it has been documented that the prevalence of obesity in developed nations is inversely related to SES; while, obesity in developing countries is most prevalent among the wealthy.7 For example, in a study in the United States, low family income (ie, < $25,000) during the prenatal period was significantly associated with high body mass index (BMI) during the adult years. Interestingly, an increase of $10,000 in family income reduced the odds of becoming either overweight or obese as an adult.Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
In contrast, results from a study with families of preschool-age children in the United States and France did not support the relationship between household income and children’s BMI.9 However, when examining the relationship between maternal employment and children’s BMI, an additional 10 hours of work per week by mothers, particularly for children between the ages of 3 and 11, was found to substantially increase the likelihood of children becoming obese. This risk was greatest among children of single working mothers.10 Unlike Musher-Eizenman et al’s research,9 a study in Japan found that maternal employment was not associated with an increase in children’s BMI even after adjusting for care by grandparents.11
Adding to this paradox, higher SES has been found to be associated with permissive parenting style. This parenting style, when parents relinquish their authority to their child in making decisions about eating and activity, has been shown to be related to an increased weight status among children.12–14
It is also well known that obesity occurs in nearly all ethnic and racial groups with some groups affected more than others.15–17 More specifically, results from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey have shown that Hispanic and non-Hispanic black children less than 11 years of age are at greatest risk for being overweight or obese; however, non-Hispanic white and non-Hispanic Asian children are less likely to become overweight or obese.16 These data support the unique variability in the contribution of income and ethnicity to childhood obesity and emphasize the importance of being culturally sensitive when addressing this issue.Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
Numerous studies have examined the relationships between childhood obesity, SES, and ethnicity, as well as issues associated with parenting.7–17 However, there are no known studies that have synthesized the data on the role of the parent in the development of childhood obesity or discussed the implications for health programs and policy. Thus, the purpose of this integrative review was to focus on identifying and describing parent roles, which may be related to the development of obesity in children and to suggest implications for health programs and policies.Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
The article “The Role of Parents in Preventing Childhood Obesity” from The Future of Children, Vol. 16 No. 1, Childhood Obesity the authors Ana C. Lindsey, Katarina M. Sussner, Juhee Kim, and Steven Gortmaker have collaborated together to construct this article published by Princeton University. The authors have used footnotes in the article appropriately to direct the reader to key points and their origin of the information. In this article the authors have come together to elaborate the importance of how a parent’s role in their child’s life can prevent and correct one of the nation’s biggest problems: obesity. The article touches on multiple options that parents have to prevent and correct childhood obesity within their families. Several programs and studies have been created that include how the child’s nutritional habits are effected by the way their parents eat, the child’s growth and nutritional habits, and ways to decrease activities that prevent physical activities and promote unhealthy eating habits i.e. Television. Certain programs such as WIC, Planet Health, CATCH, and GEMS along with many other successful programs have been mentioned in the article. The authors present the stem of the issue, childhood obesity, and they effectively present means to solve and prevent the problem.
The authors take a chronological approach to the article, which is beneficial with this particular topic. They begin the article by stressing the importance of the parents’ role in preventing and correcting childhood obesity. The authors goes back as far as the gestational period by including an entire section dedicated to the issue called “Gestation and Infancy”, and then work their way into the link between the “Parents Activity Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
…as essential to the solutions that were presented towards the closing of the article. The authors constructed the article in manner that stated how the reader could prevent childhood obesity from the beginning and progressed into additional complicated situations as the child develops. In the article parental involvement, a variety of studies and the outcomes, and multiple programs were provided to the reader to prevent and/or correct childhood obesity. The article was well assembled, cited appropriately, and provided key topics when addressing the theme. The authors have provided a strong and concise approach to concern of childhood obesity. Parental Roles for Healthy Lifestyle of Children Essay
