Impact of Speed-Eating Habit on Subsequent Body Mass Index and Blood Pressure Among Schoolchildren　― The Ibaraki Children’s Cohort Study (IBACHIL)

Background:Habitual speed eating is a risk factor of obesity but evidence of this in children is limited. We examined the association between speed-eating habit and subsequent body mass index (BMI) and blood pressure (BP) among Japanese children.Methods and Results:The community-based study comprised 1,490 Japanese boys and girls who were born in 1989, involved in the Ibaraki Children’s Cohort Study at age 3 years, and had returned questionnaires at both ages 6 and 12 years. In a subsample, we measured BP (n=263). Speed-eating habit was categorized into 4 groups: Never, Quit, Newly, and Continuous. Sex-specific mean values of questionnaire-based BMI and measured BPs at age 12 were examined according to speed-eating habit. Children with continuous speed eating had a higher BMI at age 12 than those who had never had a speed-eating habit (20.0 vs. 17.9 kg/m2for boys (P