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This review paper seeks to conceptualise childhood obesity through clinical, operational, and financial procedures. It informs multiple disciplines about: the trajectory of paediatric obesity and current recommendations; the trends in the clinical, administrative/policy and financial worlds of paediatric obesity; and discusses commonly misunderstood collaborative terms.

The paper is based on analysis of national and international policy documents and research papers in the field.

Paediatric obesity treatment teams, programmes, and providers could all benefit from a document that bridges the disciplines of medicine, other professions, and financial management. A family centred, multidisciplinary approach is necessary at all stages of obesity treatment care and the three‐world model discussed is helpful in achieving this. The clinical, operational, and financial aspects of the service need to be integrated in a way that reduces the barriers to accessing services.

The paper combines perspectives from different service sectors: clinical, operational, and financial. To facilitate interdisciplinary cooperation, it offers common definitions of terms that often have different meanings for those involved.

The aim of this literature review is to summarise and synthesise the research base concerning childhood obesity and physical activity, particularly in relation to teachers and schools and within a policy context of the UK. The review investigates childhood obesity, physical activity, physical education, the role of teachers, the role of schools and physical activity in the classroom.

A literature review was undertaken involving selection of primary research and other systematic reviews. A computer search was performed using a combination of keywords including: obesity, prevention, intervention, preventive, teachers, schools, healthy schools, role models, physical activity, physical education, active school, active classroom. The review also includes samples of media coverage of the issue.

This review highlights the complex and ambiguous nature of the evidence in relation to this important contemporary issue.

A limited understanding of childhood obesity is evident from the review and this precludes definitive conclusions in relation to almost all aspects of the agenda. More quality research is needed in almost all areas of the topic, including areas such as the engagement of schools and teachers.

The aim of this paper is to qualitatively examine the ways in which primary school children, aged between 7 and 12, perceive various facets of obesity as defined by the common sense model of illness representation (CCM).

The study was qualitative in nature. Semi‐structured interviews were conducted with 33 children on all dimensions of the CSM. Twenty four children were normal weight and nine were overweight. A drawing task formed the methodology for the “identity” section of the interview.

Although children identified food intake as a main cause of obesity, almost half did not name sedentary behaviours as a cause of obesity. Duration (timeline) of obesity was regarded by most children as reliant on a person's undertaking of positive health behaviours. Normal weight children were found to list more severe consequences of obesity than the overweight group. It was found that experience contributed to the detailed knowledge of overweight children's perceptions of cures of obesity. Overweight children also spoke of personal incidents of barriers to cures.

The findings suggest that the CSMs can be used to classify children's perceptions of obesity. Future childhood obesity interventions can utilise these findings to create campaigns and strategies that are more consistent with children's understandings of this condition.

To the authors' knowledge, no previous study has examined children's perceptions of obesity beyond perceived causes.

This paper aims to provide a summary of current policy and research related to pre‐school overweight and obesity, and to provide a rationale for why early years settings are being placed at the forefront of strategies to address the problem.

The paper is based on a narrative review of current research, policy and practice.

Today 22.9 per cent of four and five year olds are overweight or obese. The Healthy Weight, Healthy Lives strategy is a cross‐government initiative, which aims to make England the first major country to reverse the obesity epidemic. The pre‐school period represents a critical time for interventions, which could prevent excess weight gain and its associated physical and psychological damage to health.

Practitioners in early years settings have a significant contribution to make to promoting the healthy weight of children.

Concerns about overweight in childhood have received much attention. This paper seeks to raise awareness of the importance of the pre‐school period, and to provide a useful review of current research, policy and sources of support for those who are best placed to address the issue.

The purpose of this paper is to describe and briefly discuss the prevalence of childhood obesity in selected countries of the WHO European Region in relation to socioeconomic status (SES) and ethnic origin. Emphasis was given on the most recent research papers available.

A search was performed on relevant papers on “Prevalence of Obesity and Overweight in relation to socio‐economic status and ethnicity” using MEDLINE and the ISI Web of Science. The search was limited to the age range 0‐20 years to the countries of the WHO European Region.

A growing number of studies suggest that children in lower‐income families in developed countries are particularly vulnerable to becoming obese. Plausible explanations for the differences in obesity prevalence in migrant children and children with lower SES include poor diet, limited opportunity for physical activity and differences in the perception of ideal body weight together with possible food security issues. It is important to stress that the rising cost of a healthy diet is of great concern.

Understanding the prevalence of obesity in children and the social and cultural parameters related to the phenomenon can facilitate the formation of effective public health intervention policies in counteracting childhood obesity.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate excess body weight and abdominal obesity in relation to selected psychosocial characteristics such as self-perception, self-esteem and anxiety, in primary school children.

A school-based cross-sectional study was conducted with a total of 528 students 10-12 years of age, randomly selected, from the area of Athens, Greece. The Greek versions of the self-perception profile for children (SPPC) and the state-trait anxiety inventory for children (STAI-C) questionnaires have been used to determine the children’s self-perception/self-esteem and the status of anxiety, respectively. Standard anthropometric measurements were also taken. Pearson correlation coefficient was used to test for possible linear correlations between data variables. One-way ANOVA and independent t-test were used to determine statistically significant differences between the means of children’s body mass index (BMI) – abdominal obesity groups. For multiple comparisons, Bonferroni post-tests were run.

Overweight and obese children and children with abdominal obesity had lower scores in all of the domains of SPPC self-perception, the SPPC global self-esteem and the STAI-C anxiety levels in comparison to normal weight children. BMI and abdominal obesity correlated negatively with each one of the five domains of the SPPC self-perception (p < 0.001) and the SPPC global self-esteem (p < 0.001) and positively with the STAI-C anxiety levels (p < 0.005). One-way ANOVA and independent t-test revealed statistically significant differences between the means of children’s BMI and abdominal obesity groups in all the domains of SPPC self-perception (p < 0.001), the SPPC global self-esteem (p < 0.001) and the STAI-C anxiety levels (p < 0.005). There were no gender differences in the psychometric characteristics assessed in this study.

Primary school children with excess body weight and abdominal obesity have increased anxiety levels and they score lower in key psychosocial characteristics, in comparison to normal weight children.

Obesity leads to increased mortality and morbidity among children, as well as when they turn adults. Melding marketing theories in social influence and message framing, this study aims to examine how compliance versus conformance social influence, each framed either prescriptively or proscriptively, may guide children’s choice of healthy versus unhealthy food.

This study conducted two experiments in a Pakistani junior school. Experiment 1 exposed children to either a prescriptive or a proscriptive compliance influence. Experiment 2 involved a 2 (prescriptive vs proscriptive compliance influence) × 2 (supportive vs conflicting conformance-influence) between-subjects design. Participants in both studies answered an online survey after being exposed to the social-influence messages.

Experiment 1 showed proscriptive was stronger than prescriptive compliance influence in nudging children to pick fruits (healthy) over candies (unhealthy). However, frequency of fruits dropped as susceptibility to compliance strengthened. Experiment 2 found that a proscriptive compliance influence reinforced by a supportive conformance-influence led to most children picking fruits. However, a conflicting conformance influence was able to sway some children away from fruits to candies. This signalled the importance of harmful peer influence, particularly with children who were more likely to conform.

Childhood is a critical stage for inculcating good eating habits. Besides formal education about food and health, social influence within classrooms can be effective in shaping children’s food choice. While compliance and conformance influence can co-exist, one influence can reinforce or negate the other depending on message framing.

In developing countries like Pakistan, institutional support to tackle childhood obesity may be weak. Teachers can take on official, yet informal, responsibility to encourage healthy eating. Governments can incentivise schools to organise informal activities to develop children’s understanding of healthy consumption. Schools should prevent children from bringing unhealthy food to school, so that harmful peer behaviours are not observable, and even impose high tax on unhealthy products or subsidise healthy products sold in schools.

This study adopts a marketing lens and draws on social influence and message framing theory to shed light on children’s food choice behaviour within a classroom environment. The context was an underexplored developing country, Pakistan, where childhood obesity is a public health concern.

The purpose of this paper is to estimate the prevalence of the risk of overweight and overweight in Qatari children ages 9 through 11 and to compare the prevalence using CDC and IOTF cut‐offs.

A cross‐sectional study in a randomly selected sample of 1,213 Qatari children was carried out. Weight and height were measured and BMI was calculated for all children. The risk of overweight and overweight were defined using as references both the CDC BMI percentiles for age and gender and IOTF cut‐off values.

Weight, height, and BMI increased with age and differences were significant (p<0.0001). According to the CDC and IOTF references, the overall prevalence of the risk of overweight affected 15.8 and 21.1 per cent respectively, while overweight was prevalent in 21.8 and 17.7 per cent respectively. Using either reference, the prevalence of the risk of overweight was higher among girls compared with boys (22.4 per cent, 19.4 per cent respectively), while overweight was higher among boys than among girls (20.6 per cent, 15.5 per cent respectively) but the differences were not statistically significant for both.

This study focused on children aged 9‐11 years, which represents a transition period between childhood and adolescence. Studying overweight in childhood is important since identification of children who may become obese adults can facilitate early intervention and avoidance of the morbidity and mortality associated with adult obesity. Limited studies on the prevalence of overweight have been conducted in Qatar.

The purpose of this review was to highlight the association between ID and obesity in toddlers and preschool children.

This review aimed to review and evaluate literature of the published research discussing the relationship between ID and overweight and obesity in children under the age of 5 years. Conflicting results of iron status in overweight and obese children under the age of 5 years had been found. However, most articles concluded that ID is associated significantly with overweight and obesity in children because of the systemic inflammatory reaction which is considered the major cause of ID; hepcidin with its resultant effect in decreasing duodenal absorption of iron; in addition to other causes including dietary and genetic factors.

Conflicting results of iron status in overweight and obese children under the age of 5 years had been found, but most articles concluded that ID is associated significantly with overweight and obesity in children, with systemic inflammatory reaction being the major cause through hepcidin with its resultant effect in decreased duodenal absorption of iron, in addition to other causes including dietary and genetic factors.

Many nutrients have been associated with weight gain and ID development. Unbalanced diet either in excess or shortage may affect weight status and serum iron profile. Future research is needed to study more in depth the association between ID and obesity in toddlers and preschool children and to further explore the various factors involved in pathogenesis of ID.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate children's understandings of the intent and importance of current media initiatives designed to target childhood obesity. Semi‐structured interviews were analysed using qualitative content analysis, for the responses of overweight and normal weight children.

In total, 33 children were interviewed, 24 of normal weight and nine overweight. They were shown two print and four television advertisements from the New South Wales Health Department web site that were popularly broadcast between 2003 and 2007. Children were then asked if they had seen the advertisement prior to the interview, and their understanding of the intent and importance of the advertisements.

Most children in both weight groups recalled seeing five out of the six presented advertisements prior to interview. The main themes identified were “Health Maintenance” and “Illness Prevention” for five of the six advertisements. Overweight children were more numerous in their detection of a health message as opposed to normal weight children, who mostly commented on the safety aspect of advertisement six.

Future evaluations of mediated health campaigns should go beyond recording simple recall of campaign material and investigate instead the understandings of target groups. Mediated health campaigns should also specify messages to particular target groups, as they appear to be most likely to facilitate behaviour change.

Mediated health campaigns are mostly evaluated quantitatively rather than by qualitative means. In addition, no study has evaluated the views of overweight and normal weight children with regards to these health campaigns.