MINNEAPOLIS, April 13 (UPI) -- Parents of children age 5 and younger have different dietary and exercise habits than young adults without children, U.S. researchers say.
Jerica M. Berge of the University of Minnesota Medical School, Nicole Larson and Katherine W. Bauer and Dianne Neumark-Sztainer of the University of Minnesota, say the analysis was drawn from Project Eating and Activity in Teens and Young Adults, a longitudinal population-based study.
The study involved 838 women and 682 men from diverse ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds. Regression models were used to examine associations between parental status and dietary intake, hours of physical activity, and body mass index.
Results were adjusted for each health behavior outcome level five years earlier.
The study, published in the journal Pediatrics, found that although many dietary behaviors were the same between men and women who were parents and men and women without children -- mothers reported drinking more sugar-sweetened beverages and consuming more calories, and they ate more saturated fat compared with women with no children.
In addition, parents had lower amounts of physical activity compared to similar age men and women without children. Mothers had higher mean BMIs than women without children, but there was difference BMI difference between fathers and men without children.
