Effect of Unbalanced Dietary Habits to the Body Development of Preschool Children

Abstract

The dietary habit and life style of preschool children will affect nutrient intake for children. Nutrient intake for preschool children is critical because it affects the growth and is an influencing factor for adult health status when they grow up.The objective of this research is to study how nutrient intake and life style will affect the body development for preschool children. Generally, 87% of children reporting had a good dietary habit, 53% of children had regular meals, 18% of children had balanced meals, and 39% of children had unbalanced meals. Children who eat unbalanced meal had relatively lower intake of meat, fish, egg, soy bean, kimchi, vegetable, fruit, and ate irregular meal compare to the children who eat balanced meal. However, those who eat unbalanced meal had relatively higher sweet food such as ice cream, cookie, and carbonated beverage and had lower intakes of niacin, Ca, and Zn.According to Kaup Index, 59.8% of reporting children had normal weight(KI=15‐18), 28.9 % are under‐weighted, and 11.3% are over‐weight or obese. In contrast, according to 20% of body fat, 14.9% of reporting children were under‐weighted, 20.6% were normal‐ weighted, 20.6% were obese, and 46.1% were over‐weighted or obese. Among children who eat balanced meal, 64.9% were normal‐weighted and 27.3% were under‐weighted, while among children who eat unbalanced meal, 30.4% were under‐weighted and 58.4% were normal‐weighted (p<0.01)Consequently, it is imperative to develop the teaching program for nutritionists and teachers who take care the children in the preschool facility.