Kid eating McDonald's (Photo : Reuters)
Fast food consumption can directly impact the quality of performance of children in schools, say researchers from Ohio University, who studied 11, 700 children to find out how fast food affect their academics.
It is common knowledge that eating too much of fast food and sugary drinks can lead to obesity. Now researchers have come up with evidence to prove that regular fast food consumption can lead to bad performance in school. This study was published in the journal Clinical Pediatrics.
The researchers studied and measured the consumption level of fast food in children at age 10 and then compared it with their test results in school, which included science, math and reading, three years later.
"Our results show clear and consistent associations between children's fast food consumption in 5th grade and academic growth between 5th and 8th grade. These results provide initial evidence that fast food consumption is associated with deleterious academic outcomes among children," Washington Post quoted the researchers.
The scientists added that even tiny increases in the frequency with which the kids consumed junk food was directly linked with poor performance in academics.
Half of the sample children, whom the researchers studied, ate fast food one to three times a week, and almost three quarters of them ate fast food once a week.
Stating that fast food consumption undoubtedly gives rise to childhood obesity, study lead author Kathy Putell said that the problem does not end there. "Relying too much on fast food could hurt how well children do in the classroom. We're not saying that parents should never feed their children fast food, but these results suggest fast-food consumption should be limited as much as possible," Medical News Today quoted Purtell saying.
In 2008, it was found that almost one-third of kids aged between two and eleven ate junk food and nearly half of the children in the age group of 12 and 19 ate fast food from restaurants daily.
Even though Purtell and her team have been successful in establishing the link between fast food consumption and poor academic performance, they were unable to point out exactly why eating fast food in fifth grade was associated with under performance in the eighth grade.
The scientists say that junk food lacks nutrients such as iron, which is responsible for the cognitive development in children. They have also linked sugary and high fat diet to poor leaning skills and impaired memory.
