BodiMojo Teen Health Blog – Teenage Nutrition, Fitness, Stress, Relationships & More

There is encouraging news on the childhood obesity prevention front.  A pilot study published in the current issue of the Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior reports that cell phone text messaging may be a viable way for children and families to monitor healthy eating and exercise habits.  This in turn could prevent becoming overweight later in life.

The study, conducted by Jennifer Shapiro, PhD, at UNC, and colleagues in Heidelberg, Germany, compared three groups of families with children (N=58) ages 5 to 13.  Over three weeks, the families took part in a weekly education session to encourage the following behaviors:  increase physical activity, minimize TV watching and lessen the amount of sugar-sweetened beverages consumed. Then the families were split into three groups: (1) self-monitoring by cell phone text messaging (SMS), (2) self-monitoring by written food dairies, and 3) no self- monitoring at all.

In the text-messaging group, the child and a parent each entered their behaviors on their pedometer reading for number of steps that day, amount of sweetened beverages, and screen time.  The child and parent then received immediate feedback, along the lines of “Wow, you met your step and screen times goals. Congratulations! What happened to the beverages?”

In total, 31 families completed the study. It turns out the kids in cell phone group were significantly more likely to self-monitor (43 percent) than those with paper and pencil dairies (19 percent).  They were less likely to drop out of the study, too.

The method for self-monitoring with a cell phone is becoming increasingly popular as companies such as Sensei and Wellsphere offer such services to adults.  It’s nice to see these encouraging results with children.  And what kid wouldn’t want a cell phone – especially at such a young age? While cell phone bills might go up, that’s peanuts compared to the cost of being overweight later in life.  Seems like a win-win.

– Contributed by Tara Cousineau PhD

An Adolescent at Heart