How mothers should talk to daughters about weight loss

Mother talk of weight concerns moderates negative outcomes of encouragement to lose weight on daughter body dissatisfaction and disordered eating. PHOTO | FILE

What you need to know:

  • “Generally, we found that for the daughters who were being encouraged to lose weight by their mothers, outcomes were worse if their mothers were not also discussing their own weight concerns,” Ms Hillard said.
  • “The daughters who were being encouraged to lose weight but whose mothers were not also discussing their own weight concerns were more at risk for development of disordered eating, based on the higher scores on measures of dieting behaviour and drive for thinness they reported in eighth grade.”

Mothers should be cautious when discussing diet and weight with their daughters, the University of Notre Dame in the US said on its website on Tuesday, citing a study by the institution.

In the paper, In it together: Mother talk of weight concerns moderates negative outcomes of encouragement to lose weight on daughter body dissatisfaction and disordered eating, Erin Hillard, a developmental psychology doctoral student at the university, fellow Notre Dame psychology graduate student Rebecca A Morrissey, Notre Dame faculty members Dawn M Gondoli, an associate professor of psychology, and Alexandra F Corning, a research associate professor of psychology, reported on results from their study of a representative group of sixth- through eighth-grade girls and their mothers.

“Generally, we found that for the daughters who were being encouraged to lose weight by their mothers, outcomes were worse if their mothers were not also discussing their own weight concerns,” Ms Hillard said. “The daughters who were being encouraged to lose weight but whose mothers were not also discussing their own weight concerns were more at risk for development of disordered eating, based on the higher scores on measures of dieting behaviour and drive for thinness they reported in eighth grade.”

Ms Hillard said that the study findings as a whole suggested more about what mothers should not be talking about than what they should. “After all,” she said, “the best outcomes were found for daughters whose mothers were not engaging in either type of conversation. They do shed light on the complexity of the issue of talking to children about their weight in ways that don’t lead to poor health outcomes in the long run.”

The paper is in the journal Body Image.