Obesity Articles

Childhood obesity, inactivity and poor food choices are taking a toll on today’s youth. In some cases, structured exercise is encouraged for weight management. Unfortunately, this approach doesn’t seem to be working.

Preadolescence is a time of major change and growth, bringing psychological, physical and social shifts for boys and girls alike. Caught between the carefree days of childhood and the first throes of being a teenager, “tweens” (roughly aged 9–12) are a force to be reckoned with. Like many other populations, preadolescents are suffering from lack of exercise, which threatens to chart a course toward obesity and disease.

Robyn Stuhr is the sports medicine program director at UC San Diego Health System’s department of orthopaedic surgery. She also serves as an American Council on Exercise (ACE) subject-matter expert and media spokesperson.

Friends may have our backs, but their health and fitness habits can literally shape our backsides. How do friends help—or hurt—your healthy habits? Learn more from Martina M. Cartwright, PhD, RD, adjunct faculty member at the University of Arizona, independent biomedical consultant, author and nutrition counselor in Scottsdale, Arizona.

People are profoundly tuned in to the fact that obesity and all the chronic disease that goes with it are plaguing much of the world. But, why, with such hyperawareness plus so many research developments on the nutrition and obesity fronts, do we still seem to be getting fatter and sicker?

Two human behaviors explain why we’re still here: engaging in sex and consuming food. Both are inextricably linked by dopamine, the neurotransmitter associated with reward and pleasure. It’s what motivates us to read all three volumes of Fifty Shades of Grey or to inhale a plate of mom’s homemade oatmeal raisin cookies. To date, procreative activities have maintained their primal prerogative without too much deviation from nature’s blueprint.

Dr. Muth is a pediatrician, registered dietitian and board-certified specialist in sports dietetics (CSSD). Muth also serves as an ACE Senior Fitness Consultant and subject matter expert, regularly contributing to ACE blogs and to the ACE Certified News monthly newsletter. Her first book, Eat Your Vegetables and Other Mistakes Parents Make: Redefining How to Raise Healthy Eaters, was published by Healthy Learning in May 2012. ACE: As a registered dietitian and pediatrician, what would you say is the biggest challenge we face in overcoming the obesity epidemic?

While rising rates of diabetes and prediabetes in U.S. children have been causing alarm in recent years, youth in China appear to be faring far worse. For Chinese teenagers the rate of diabetes is nearly four times higher than it is for their counterparts in the U.S., say researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, who examined data from the 2009 China Health and Nutrition Survey.

Twenty-five years ago Debra Mazda, MEd, of Mazda Motivations LLC, visited a health club and experienced firsthand the feeling of not belonging. At age 21, she weighed over 300 pounds. Depressed and battling high blood pressure, she decided to reinvent her life. “I was the only seriously fat person in the gym,” she remembers. Undaunted, she sweated her way through ae...