Extension Communications
3614 Administrative Services Building
Ames, Iowa 50011-3614
(515) 294-9915
4/17/03
For immediate release
Contacts:
Ruth Litchfield, Human Nutrition and Food Science, (515) 294-9484, litch@iastate.edu
Diane Nelson, Continuing Education and Communication Services, (515) 294-3178,
dinelson@iastate.edu
Help Children Say No to TV and Yes to a Healthier Life
AMES, Iowa---If you've thought about getting a television viewing make-over, next week is your opportunity. You can be part of an international movement by participating in the ninth annual TV-Turnoff Week April 21-27. Stage your own "reality" programming and make a big difference in your child's health.
"Past participants say the 7-day break helped their families rediscover rewarding screen-free activities," said Ruth Litchfield, Iowa State University Extension nutrition specialist. "More importantly, research suggests that decreasing a child's TV viewing by 6 hours a week reduces the risk of the child being overweight by more than 30 percent."
Children aged 8-16 who watch 1 hour or less per day have been shown to have the lowest prevalence of being overweight. Conversely, children who watch 4 or more hours per day are most likely to be overweight. Viewer studies say children 8-18 years of age average 4.5 hours per day or 31.5 hours of television per week. The proportion of children ages 6 to 19 who met the definition of overweight has more than doubled in the past 40 years.
Being overweight has become a way of life for many Americans. But a new study says that quality of life for severely overweight children is comparable to that of children undergoing chemotherapy for cancer. Details were recently reported by the Journal of the American Medical Association. Same-age children of similar heights who differed in weight were asked to describe problems they had doing various activities, such as bathing alone, participating in sports, paying attention in class, and missing school because they didn't feel well.
"The average score of healthy children was 83, cancer patients 69, and severely overweight children 67," Litchfield said. "In addition to quality of life, severely overweight children missed more school (4 days versus 1 day of school per month) and had higher incidence of type 2 diabetes (4 percent) and high cholesterol (37 percent)."
For more information on TV-Turnoff Week visit the following Web sites:
Coalition for Quality Children's Media
http://www.cqcm.org/kidsfirst/start.html
TV Turnoff Network and The Television Project
http://www.tvp.org
Parental Media Guide
http://parentalguide.org
Safe Kids
http://safekids.com/
Entertainment Software Rating Board
http://www.esrb.org
More details on the quality of life study can be found at
http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/289/14/1813
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