Web surfing may not be main reason for teenage weight gain

  02 October 2015    Read: 1004
Web surfing may not be main reason for teenage weight gain
Web surfing may not be as big a factor in teenage weight gain as how many excess pounds children are carrying around at the start of adolescence, a Swiss study suggests.
Researchers followed a group of 621 youths from age 14 to 16 and found the teens who were overweight at the start of the study were 20 times more likely to be overweight two years later than their peers who began at a healthy weight. For those who became overweight, excessive Internet use wasn`t linked to the added pounds.

"Internet use could at most reinforce an already existing risk of being overweight," the study team concludes in the International Journal of Obesity.

"Nowadays Internet use is almost a necessity to survive in this world, as youths are asked to use this technology," lead study author Yara Barrense-Dias of the Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine at Lausanne University Hospital told Reuters Health by email.

"For this reason we must differentiate between screen time devoted to school or work and screen time devoted to leisure," Barrense-Dias added. "Parents should encourage their children to do other activities on the side, to eat healthily and do physical exercise regularly."

Globally, roughly 1.9 billion adults are overweight or obese, as are about 42 million children under the age of 5, according the World Health Organization. Obesity increases the risk of heart disease, diabetes, joint disorders and certain cancers.

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