Liu Yue, Zhao Jianmei, Zhong Hai
China Academy of Public Finance and Public Policy, Central University of Finance and Economics, 39 South College Road, Beijing, 100081, China.
SSM Popul Health. 2021 Dec 16;17:101003. doi: 10.1016/j.ssmph.2021.101003. eCollection 2022 Mar.
Ongoing increases in childhood obesity have become a serious public health concern. Meanwhile, caregiving by grandparents becomes a worldwide social phenomenon. This study estimates the effect of grandparental care on childhood obesity and explores its pathways. Utilizing five waves of panel data from the China Family Panel Studies, we found that grandparental care significantly increases the probability of childhood obesity, adding 3.6 percentage points. The effect is heterogeneous between boys and girls and between grandparents with different education attainments. The channels through which grandparents contribute to childhood obesity include inappropriate dietary patterns and insufficient physical activities. Additionally, we found that grandparents' famine experience generates a long-term fear of hunger, which translates into overfeeding their grandchildren, thus aggravating childhood obesity in China.
儿童肥胖率的持续上升已成为一个严重的公共卫生问题。与此同时，祖父母照顾孙辈成为一种全球社会现象。本研究估计了祖父母照顾对儿童肥胖的影响，并探讨其影响途径。利用中国家庭追踪调查的五期面板数据，我们发现祖父母照顾显著增加了儿童肥胖的概率，提高了3.6个百分点。这种影响在男孩和女孩之间以及不同教育程度的祖父母之间存在差异。祖父母导致儿童肥胖的途径包括不适当的饮食模式和体育活动不足。此外，我们发现祖父母的饥荒经历产生了长期的饥饿恐惧，这转化为过度喂养孙辈，从而加剧了中国儿童的肥胖问题。
