Martinson Melissa L, McLanahan Sara, Brooks-Gunn Jeanne
School of Social Work, University of Washington, 4101 15th Avenue NE, Seattle, WA, 98105, USA,
Matern Child Health J. 2015 Feb;19(2):373-80. doi: 10.1007/s10995-014-1519-7.
This paper examines body mass index (BMI) trajectories among children from different race/ethnic and maternal nativity backgrounds in the United States and England from early- to middle-childhood. This study is the first to examine race/ethnic and maternal nativity differences in BMI trajectories in both countries. We use two longitudinal birth cohort studies-The Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (n = 3,285) for the United States and the Millennium Cohort Study (n = 6,700) for England to estimate trajectories in child BMI by race/ethnicity and maternal nativity status using multilevel growth models. In the United States our sample includes white, black, and Hispanic children; in England the sample includes white, black, and Asian children. We find significant race/ethnic differences in the initial BMI and BMI trajectories of children in both countries, with all non-white groups having significantly steeper BMI growth trajectories than whites. Nativity differences in BMI trajectories vary by race/ethnic group and are only statistically significantly higher for children of foreign-born blacks in England. Disparities in BMI trajectories are pervasive in the United States and England, despite lower overall BMI among English children. Future studies should consider both race/ethnicity and maternal nativity status subgroups when examining disparities in BMI in the United States and England. Differences in BMI are apparent in early childhood, which suggests that interventions targeting pre-school age children may be most effective at stemming childhood disparities in BMI.
本文研究了美国和英国不同种族/族裔以及母亲出生地背景的儿童从幼儿期到童年中期的体重指数（BMI）轨迹。本研究首次考察了两国BMI轨迹在种族/族裔和母亲出生地方面的差异。我们使用两项纵向出生队列研究——美国的脆弱家庭与儿童福利研究（样本量n = 3285）和英国的千禧队列研究（样本量n = 6700），通过多水平增长模型按种族/族裔和母亲出生地状况估计儿童BMI轨迹。在美国，我们的样本包括白人、黑人及西班牙裔儿童；在英国，样本包括白人、黑人及亚裔儿童。我们发现两国儿童的初始BMI及BMI轨迹存在显著的种族/族裔差异，所有非白人组的BMI增长轨迹均比白人组显著更陡。BMI轨迹的出生地差异因种族/族裔群体而异，仅英国外国出生黑人的子女在统计学上显著更高。尽管英国儿童的总体BMI较低，但美国和英国的BMI轨迹差异普遍存在。未来研究在考察美国和英国的BMI差异时应考虑种族/族裔和母亲出生地状况亚组。BMI差异在幼儿期就很明显，这表明针对学龄前儿童的干预措施可能最有效地遏制儿童期的BMI差异。
