Nutrition/Obesity
Longitudinal associations of maternal pre-pregnancy income variability with childhood overweight and obesity Mehrnaz Siavoshi* Mehrnaz Siavoshi
Childhood obesity is growing in the United States and has been linked to significant negative health outcomes, including youth-onset Type 2 Diabetes, hypertension, negative mental health outcomes, and other comorbidities. Therefore, there is a growing interest in understanding factors that contribute to childhood obesity. Previous research has demonstrated that mothers in poverty have children with increased odds of overweight and obesity. However, there is limited understanding of how stability or variability in maternal pre-pregnancy income and poverty status impact these odds. The National Longitudinal Surveys of Youth from 1979 and the associated child dataset was used to explore pre-pregnancy income variability and child overweight outcomes. Six years of pre-pregnancy maternal income data and poverty status was analyzed for a cohort of 6,404 children born between 1988 and 2016. Sustained maternal poverty in the six years before a child’s birth was associated with increased incidence of childhood overweight and obesity (OR = 2.49, 95% CI [1.50, 4.16]). Moving from poverty status out of poverty, or moving into poverty when previously not in poverty status did not result in significantly different rates of childhood overweight or obesity as compared to those who were sustained in the out of poverty category. Race did not play a significant role in the relationship between poverty status variability and childhood obesity. The results from this study suggest that even short-term poverty reduction programs may have a sustained positive impact on reducing the prevalence of childhood overweight and obesity among the vulnerable low income population.