Volume 3 | Issue 3 | July-September 2018
57
The authors note some limitations,
Informatively, this study was funded
by Cohorts and Longitudinal Studies
Enhancement Resources’ (CLOSER),
a collaborative research programme
funded by the UK Economic and
Social Research Council, Medical
Research Council and based at the
UCL Institute of Education and
was additionally supported by the
Academy of Medical Sciences/the
Wellcome Trust. It was conducted
by researchers from UCL and
Loughborough University.
These include the end of war time
rationing in 1954, when diets typically
included higher consumption of
vegetables, and lower consumption of
sugar and soft drinks. Since that time,
the food environment has become
increasingly obesogenic, and society
has become more unequal, which
may have particularly impacted on
the access to healthy foods among
socially
disadvantaged
families,
resulting in increased childhood
BMI among these groups. In addition,
inequalities in adult BMI emerged
in the 1980s, and may have
contributed to childhood BMI
changes, as parents’ and children’s
BMIs are associated.
As BMI does not account for level of fat,
it may be an inexact measure of obesity,
and could have led to healthy children
being miscategorised as ov erweight or
obese. Lastly, father’s occupation is only
one aspect of socioeconomic position,
although the results remained the
same when repeated using mother’s
education level.
Inequalities generally widened with
age. By the age of 15 years, BMI
inequalities were present across all
cohorts except the 1946 cohort and
were largest in the 2001 cohort (1.4
kg/m2 difference between the most
Explaining the differences in
childhood height, weight and BMI
since the post-war period, the
authors point to the considerable
changes to diets and physical
activity levels in Britain.
including that most children
enrolled were white, so the findings
cannot be generalised to all ethnic
groups in Britain. They also note
that dropout rates were higher in
more disadvantaged children, which
could result in BMI inequalities
being under or overestimated.
As a result of the weight and height
changes, BMI inequalities were larger
and apparent earlier in childhood in
the 2001 cohort than in the earlier-
born cohorts. In the 2001 cohort,
the most disadvantaged 7-year
olds had a BMI that was 0.5 kg/m2
greater than the least disadvantaged
children.
and least disadvantaged teenagers,
compared with a difference of 0.4kg/
m2 and 0.6 kg/m2 for the 1958 and
1970 cohorts, respectively).
At the same time, differences
in weight reversed, with lower
socioeconomic
position
being
associated with lower childhood
and adolescent weight in the
1946, 1958 and 1970 cohorts,
but with higher weight in the
2001 cohort. For example, the
most disadvantaged 11-year olds
weighed 2kg less than the least
disadvantaged children in the 1946
cohort, however in the 2001 cohort,
the most disadvantaged 11-year
olds weighed 2.1kg more than the
least disadvantaged children.