Remember Dara-Lynn Weiss, who was called “Monster-Mutter #1” by a German newspaper, and lots of other uncomplimentary names by the press all over the world? This was last spring, when Vogue magazine published what Weiss wrote about childhood obesity in …

When this article was published by Today, April Fools Day was still a week in the future, so it was meant to be taken seriously. The title, “Junk food might not be addictive, after all,” makes an assumption. It hints that belief in the addictiveness of …

Sometimes it seems like research is just one big landscape of shifting sands. A unit of knowledge that seems airtight can be reversed within months. Another possibility is for empirical evidence to be conclusive, but nobody is quite sure what it’s conc …

The past few months brought news that breastfeeding is perhaps not all it was cracked up to be — at least not when the goal is the prevention of childhood obesity. The halo that surrounds breastfeeding may not shine so brightly — but some would say t …

Okay, we have learned that exercise may or may not affect obesity. When a child’s tonsils are surgically removed it may or may not increase the likelihood of obesity. School and community programs designed to alleviate obesity may or may not backfire. …

Just imagine: 1.3 billion tons is a lot of food, and that amount goes to waste around the world in a year. Not only is there no place to put so much garbage, but, come to think of it, it shouldn’t even be garbage. Here are the words of a company that i …

Yesterday, Childhood Obesity News mentioned the discouraging words heard from the C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital. A study originating there showed that, of parents whose kids went to a school with an obesity intervention program, 30% of those parents we …

In 2009, a South African health and life insurance company started a health promotion program. Customers who signed up received a benefit called HealthyFood, by which various discounts were given via a grocery corporation’s approximately 800 stores. At …

Childhood Obesity News has been considering the proposition that networking via social media can have a bit of a dark side. Electronic shenanigans have given advertisers more opportunities to slide their blandishments into the consciousnesses of childr …

In the realm of childhood obesity research, it seems like April Fool’s Day comes around pretty often. Time after time, a study seems to indicate some hopeful discovery, which turns out to be not an advance but a false alarm. Most people seem to have as …

In a study of more than 1,000 young users of the social network platform Facebook, researchers found that (in the demographic being studied) the opinion of a “strongly tied” friend means more than the opinion of a “weak tie.” A lot of people might be i …

Childhood Obesity News has been exploring the many advantages and benefits of networking with social media. But rarely is a blessing unalloyed in this world. The whole social media revolution arrived with its own set of ready-made problems, though not …

Lisa Lillien, a former Hollywood executive, segued into being a “foodologist” who specializes in making low-calorie foods taste as satisfying as high-calorie foods. Before long, she had turned that talent into what The Huffington Post writer John Roger …

Readers of Childhood Obesity News will recall Morgan Spurlock’s Supersize Me, which documented the filmmaker’s adventure as a human lab rat. He ate nothing but McDonald’s fare for a month, gained 25 pounds, sustained liver damage, and when he quit, exp …

Books are of course a much older form of media than some of the others that Childhood Obesity News has looked at. Despite the existence of so many other communication avenues, books are still happening. Several have appeared on the scene in the past fe …

Yesterday, Childhood Obesity News looked at some recent developments in the media coverage of obesity and related topics. Last summer, as described by reporter Kirsty McCormack, the “pro-anorexia website” called SkinnyGossip apparently targeted a 20-ye …

There is a video game called “Sugar Rush” where the landscape and cars are all made of candy. Possibly the characters too. Apparently, the game was released by the Disney corporation. Does it matter? In terms of the blame for the childhood obesity epid …

At the International Conference on Childhood Obesity in Portugal, one of the speakers Dr. Pretlow heard was Professor Andrew Hill, who heads the Academic Unit of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Leeds University. Dr. Hill’s interests include obesi …

Childhood Obesity News has mentioned the EarlyBird Study many times, and has used the term “childhood obesity epidemic” many times. They are found together in an interesting article that says: There may not be just one childhood obesity epidemic, but t …

Childhood Obesity News has been examining the influence of friends on childhood obesity. The concept that social networks impact individual behavior is not exactly hot off the presses. That’s why, for instance, the Eating Disorder Referral and Informat …

Childhood Obesity News found many things of interest in the Duke University Medical Center study of social media in relation to childhood obesity. One aspect has not been touched on so far. While Dr. Jennifer S. Li, who is division chief of pediatric c …

Last time, Childhood Obesity News concluded that, even though we know it makes us fat, humans love junk food. But why? Two things, says Dr. Stephen Guyenet: The reward system is what motivates you to get food and put it to your lips, every time you eat …

“Seduced by Food: Obesity and the Human Brain” is the irresistible title of a piece by Stephen Guyenet, Ph.D. (who is an obesity researcher at the University of Washington) which touches upon many of the topics discussed by Childhood Obesity News. For …

Before obesity, and especially childhood obesity, became such a well-publicized issue, people with diabetes were early adopters of any available means for sharing information and offering mutual psychological and emotional support. Along the way, some …

Last time, Childhood Obesity News started to look at the ideas of innovative design consultant Chris Waugh, who told an interviewer that “design thinking” actually offers a new approach to reducing childhood obesity. One of Waugh’s principles, he told …

Childhood Obesity News is exploring an important discovery in the area of childhood obesity, which has been discussed widely since the American Heart Association (AHA) published a scientific paper in December. It seems that weight management interventi …

Surveys of the habits of American youth between the ages of 13 and 17 find that half of them use social media on a daily basis. The American Heart Association (AHA), in a statement that was published in the January issue of its journal, Circulation, re …

Reports come and reports go, and sometimes one of them makes a big impact, like the scientific statement issued in December by the American Heart Association and published in the journal Circulation. The Duke University Medical Center research team stu …

Yesterday, Childhood Obesity News mentioned a study carried out by a team headed by Dr. J.S. Li, in part because: Results from trials of Internet-based weight management programs have shown mixed results. These have not specifically used social network …

Childhood Obesity News is looking back over the past few months on the social media front, and it seems useful to think for a moment about what social media really entails. The degree of interactivity would seem to be of paramount importance. There are …