What are the Causes of Childhood Obesity?

Childhood Obesity Causes

• Diet: excessive intake of fatty foods, such as fast foods, baked foods, soft drinks, chocolates and desserts – which are high in calories and fat content – are the primary cause for childhood obesity.
• Lack of exercise: this is a very common problem amongst children and teenagers these days, because more time is spent on gadgets such as mobile phones and video game consoles instead of playing outdoors. Lack of exercise, coupled with calorie-rich, ‘fast food and snacky’ diets contribute heavily to childhood obesity.
• Stress: some children tend to overeat to overcome emotional stress such as bullying at school, discord at home and, sometimes, even physical abuse.
• Family environment: children tend to copy habits such as poor diet and lack of exercise if the adults around them are doing the same.
• Hormones: of the total childhood obesity cases, 10% are associated with hormonal or genetic causes.