As mothers everywhere know, breakfast is the most important meal of the day. However, as scientists, we want empirical evidence. Breakfast has been associated with several health outcomes, ranging from increased academic performance, to improved quality of life, as well as enhanced dietary profiles.
While many cross-sectional studies have found that those who skip breakfast are more likely to be obese, you cannot infer temporality from this relationship. In order to do that, you need a prospective cohort study, where you follow people forward through time to determine their weight gain.
While there are very few prospective cohort studies investigating breakfast eating habits among youth, even fewer have looked at this in Asian populations. And so Tin et al set out to look at the effect of skipping breakfast on BMI among youth in Hong Kong.
More after the jump.
Continue reading “Breakfast Skipping and Change in Body Mass Index in Young Children”
Mr Epidemiology 