Overweight Teens Don’t Have a Realistic View of Body Size, Don’t Think They Are Fat

Being overweight increases the risk of up to 10 different types of cancer, including cancers of the breast and bowel. A new study by the Cancer Research has suggested that teenagers now-a-days do not worry about being overweight. For the study, researchers used data from around 5,000 children aged 13 to 15 years. These children were asked about their weight and if they thought they were too heavy, about right or too light. Later these answers were matched with their Body Mass Index (BMI). It was concluded that almost three-quarters (73%) of the teenagers had a BMI within the normal-weight range, a fifth (20%) had a BMI in the overweight category and 7% were categorized as obese. It was found that around 40% thought they were about the right weight with very few saying they were too light.

Professor Jane Wardle said, "Young people who think they're overweight when they're not can sometimes develop devastating eating disorders but they are delighted to know that most of the normal-weight teenagers had a realistic view of their body size. "

Julie Sharp, head of health information at Cancer Research UK, said, "Overweight teenagers were more likely to become overweight adults at higher risk of cancer. It is important that young people who are too heavy have support to be more active and make healthy changes to their diet as making these changes as teenagers could help protect them from cancer as adults."

The study is published in the International Journal of Obesity.

Source-ANI