Recent research has focused on family meals, specifically dinner, as an opportunity
to improve diet and the health of both children and adolescents. A handful of investigators
have provided the basic research that has brought family dinner into the forefront
of prescriptions for healthy diets of families. Gillman and colleagues (
1
) and Neumark-Sztainer and colleagues (
2
) analyzed diets of boys and girls and both found an association of frequency of family
dinner and healthful diets. Taveras and colleagues (
3
) then examined data for associations of family dinner with overweight status (body
mass index >85th percentile for age and sex based on Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention standards). An inverse association with the cross-sectional analysis was
found, but the longitudinal analysis was null (
3
). In the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, Sen (
4
) found an association among white participants between frequency of family dinner
and overweight status; however, no such association was found among African Americans
or Hispanics. In addition, Fulkerson and colleagues (
5
) surveyed almost 100,000 students (6th to 12th grades [ages 11 to 19 years], 86%
white) across the United States and found a consistent positive association between
frequency of family dinner and developmental assets (family support, peer influence,
boundaries, and expectations) and an inverse association with high-risk behaviors.
In a survey of participants in the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women,
Infants, and Children regarding family meals and their environment, there was the
suggestion that television viewing during dinner could undo the positive effects of
sitting down with family (
6
). Family dinner may be one of the buffer systems that help parents to guide children
and adolescents through the world’s many unhealthful situations, but a review of the
specifics is necessary before making recommendations.To read this article in full you will need to make a payment
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Biography
H. R. H. Rockett is a nutrition research manager, Channing Laboratory, Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston, MA.
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© 2007 American Dietetic Association. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
