Child sitting in high chair being fed broccoli on fork by mom

Fisher leads panel issuing national recommendations for children’s healthy eating

Providing young children with repeated opportunities to try healthy foods, structured meal and snack environments, and the freedom to make their own food choices are key to helping them develop lifelong healthy eating habits, according to new national recommendations from a panel co-chaired by Jennifer Orlet Fisher of the College of Public Health, convened by Healthy Eating Research. The new recommendations for children ages 2 to 8 supplement the existing U.S. Dietary Guidelines. “The U.S. Dietary Guidelines for Americans represent the state-of-the-art understanding of wha...
CORE
Social and Behavioral Sciences
Research
Obesity
Nutrition
cartoon of a man and a boy cooking with the text: Healthy Cooking at Home!

iByte4Health wins HRSA 'Preventing Childhood Obesity' challenge

“High-tech” solutions to broad public health issues don’t always need the most advanced technology. Sometimes a simple approach meets the community’s needs best. A team at the College of Public Health has won the grand prize in a competition aimed at using technology to combat childhood obesity. The winning project, iByte4Health, sends daily mobile-phone text messages and video links to parents. “We thought, people are on their phones all the time. Text messaging is a really easy way to reach people,” says Gina Tripicchio, assistant professor in the Department of S...
Obesity
CORE
Social and Behavioral Sciences
Research
yoga mat, online fitness class, and dumbbells

'Fitness orientation' and social support among predictors for long-term bariatric success

For those who have bariatric surgery procedures, increasing physical activity post-surgery is an important component of maintaining weight loss. But patients don’t always engage in enough physical activity to receive the full benefits of the surgery. A study led by Sara Kovacs, assistant professor of instruction in the Department of Kinesiology, examined what factors influence participation in physical activity among people who have had bariatric procedures. The research found the strongest predictors of increased physical activity were an increased “fitness orientation,”...
Kinesiology
CORE
Obesity
a young girl looks out a rainy window

NIMHD-funded study explores how childhood adversity connects to obesity risks

Obesity is an American epidemic, affecting approximately 40 percent of U.S. adults and 18.5 percent of children and adolescents. It is linked to health conditions including heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes and certain types of cancer, some of the leading causes of preventable, premature death. Studies have established that a mix of risk factors, including heredity and environment, can influence weight status, and obesity’s prevalence is higher in certain low income populations.    But there’s more to learn about the role of environmental factors, including adverse...
Research
Obesity
School of Social Work
woman holding baby eating a cucumber

Fisher named to panel aiming to develop guidelines to encourage healthy eating behaviors

Jennifer Orlet Fisher, professor of Social and Behavioral Sciences in the College of Public Health, has been named co-chair of the national Healthy Eating Research (HER) panel, a program of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The panel will develop scientific guidelines to encourage healthy eating behaviors among children ages two to eight. Combating childhood obesity is an objective of the HER panel, "but our primary goal is to focus on what we know about developing healthy eating behaviors," Fisher said. "In contrast to the dietary guidelines, which focus on food and nutrient...
Nutrition
Obesity
Faculty

Sarwer co-edits special issue of 'American Psychologist'

David Sarwer, associate dean for research at the College of Public Health, was an ideal choice to serve as co-editor of a special issue of American Psychologist, the flagship scientific journal of the American Psychological Association, dedicated to obesity: Sarwer directs Temple’s Center for Obesity Research and Education (CORE), and much of his work focuses on the psychosocial and behavioral aspects of obesity. Obesity is one of the most pressing long-term public health issues in the United States. Approximately 40 percent of American adults currently have obesity (defined...
Obesity
CORE
Social and Behavioral Sciences
Faculty