Helping Children Establish Habits to Overcome Obesity!

The White House Task Force on Childhood Obesity tried to increase children’s walking and biking to school to solve the problem of childhood obesity with a comprehensive initiative, Let's Move! (White House Task Force on Childhood Obesity, 2010; McDonald’s et al, 2011). Why did the Task Force suggest to increase children walking and biking to school as a solution for the childhood obesity issue? There is a lot of research to support the idea that children’s physical activity helps to overcome their obesity (Sallis et al., 2000; Sallis et al., 2012) and their activity level is increased by walking to school (Cooper, 2005; Oluyomi et al., 2014)(Figure 1). However, despite the potential benefits, the percent of students walking or cycling to school is significantly lower and, in 2009, almost half of the students walked or rode their bikes to school, compared to the ratio of students walking or riding to school in the late 60's (McDonald’s et al, 2011).

Figure 1 Combined overweight and obese rates, children ages 10 to 17

Source: Hidden Profits Marketing (2018)

What has significant change by modes of travel over the last 50 years? In the last 50 years, roads in the United States has been expanding (FHWA). In addition, the United States has gradually gone through the suburbanization (Kolko, 2015; Nicolaides & Wiese, 2017). I personally believe that the following reasons in terms of auto-oriented transportation planning could affect children’s mode choice to commute to school.

Because of the aforementioned reasons, if they prefer riding cars at a young age, they can become highly dependent on riding cars over walking. This means that student daily activities can decrease. Furthermore, this can be correlated with their obesity rate. In this regard, Walkable City by Jeff Speck reveals that the obesity rate of children has tripled and the obesity rate in teenagers has quadrupled since the 1980s. Numerous city planners and public health officials were aware of the seriousness of this situation. They urgently carried out the relationship between the ‘nature of obesity and the automotive lifestyle' to ‘the study of diseases caused by auto-oriented planning' (Jeff Speck, 2013). A study in Atlanta concluded that the possibility of becoming obese will increase by 3 percent every five minutes of driving every day (Frumkin, 2004). According to a recent study on residents in San Diego, 60 percent of residents in low-walkable areas were considered overweight (Leinberger, 2009).

In conclusion, auto-oriented city and automotive lifestyle might have a result in high obesity rates (Jeff Speck, 2013). With this said, young students are no exception. To decrease the obesity rate in students, we should be better to increase the number of their daily physical activities. If students were to walk or ride their bikes to school instead of riding vehicles, their daily physical activities will increase. America's biggest problematic issues could easily be resolved by improving daily physical activity. “What is learned in the cradle is carried to the grave!” It's time for planners to make urban and traffic plans that support walking at an early age.

Reference

Cooper, A. R., Andersen, L. B., Wedderkopp, N., Page, A. S., & Froberg, K. (2005). Physical activity levels of children who walk, cycle, or are driven to school. American journal of preventive medicine, 29(3), 179-184.

Federal Highway Administration. Highway History. Retrieved from https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/infrastructure/history.cfm

Frumkin, H., Frank, L., & Jackson, R. J. (2004). Urban sprawl and public health: Designing, planning, and building for healthy communities. Island Press.

United States Breastfeeding Committee. Let's Move & Task Force on Obesity. Retrieved from http://www.usbreastfeeding.org/p/cm/ld/fid=220

Hidden Profits Marketing. (2018). The shocking state of obesity in the United States of America. Retrieved from https://www.hiddenprofitsmarketing.com/blog/obesity-usa/

Kolko, Jed. (2015). Neighborhood Data Show That U.S. Suburbanization Continues. Retrieved from http://jedkolko.com/2016/03/25/neighborhood-data-show-that-u-s-suburbanization-continues/

Leinberger, C. B. (2009). The option of urbanism: Investing in a new American dream. Island Press.

McDonald, N. C., Brown, A. L., Marchetti, L. M., & Pedroso, M. S. (2011). US school travel, 2009: an assessment of trends. American journal of preventive medicine, 41(2), 146-151.

Nicolaides, B., & Wiese, A. (2017). Suburbanization in the United States after 1945. Oxford Research Encyclopedia of American History. Retrieved from http://americanhistory.oxfordre.com/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780199329175.001.0001/acrefore-9780199329175-e-64

Oluyomi, A. O., Lee, C., Nehme, E., Dowdy, D., Ory, M. G., & Hoelscher, D. M. (2014). Parental safety concerns and active school commute: correlates across multiple domains in the home-to-school journey. International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity, 11(1), 32.

Sallis, J. F., Prochaska, J. J., & Taylor, W. C. (2000). A review of correlates of physical activity of children and adolescents. Medicine and science in sports and exercise, 32(5), 963-975.

Sallis, J. F., Floyd, M. F., Rodríguez, D. A., & Saelens, B. E. (2012). Role of built environments in physical activity, obesity, and cardiovascular disease. Circulation, 125(5), 729-737.

Speck, J. (2013). Walkable city: How downtown can save America, one step at a time. Macmillan.

White House Task Force on Childhood Obesity. (2010). SOLVING THE PROBLEM OF CHILDHOOD OBESITY WITHIN A GENERATION.

Written by Kyuri Kim

Edited by Jesse Ray Deleon Guerrero