self-esteem and body dissatisfaction in young children: associations with weight and perceived...

Self-esteem and body dissatisfaction in youngchildren: Associations with weight and perceivedparenting stylecp_38 25..35

Amanda TAYLOR,1,2 Carlene WILSON,1,2,3,4 Amy SLATER5 and Philip MOHR1,2

1Food and Nutritional Sciences, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, Adelaide, South Australia, 2School of Psychology, the

University of Adelaide North Terrace Campus, Adelaide, South Australia, 3Cancer Council of South Australia, Eastwood, 4Flinders Centre of Innovation

in Cancer, Bedford Park, South Australia, and 5School of Psychology, Flinders University of South Australia, Bedford Park, South Australia

Key wordsbody image, paediatric overweight, parenting

style, self-esteem.

CorrespondenceAmanda Taylor, CSIRO Food and Nutritional

Sciences, PO Box 10041, Adelaide BC 5000,

South Australia, Australia.

Email: [email protected]

Received 13 June 2011; accepted 23 November

2011.

doi:10.1111/j.1742-9552.2011.00038.x

Abstract

Background: Parenting style has been associated with weight-related out-

comes in children, but relationships between parenting, weight, andoverweight-related psychological outcomes remain largely unstudied. The aimof the present study was to determine whether parenting was a moderator ofthe relationship between overweight and psychological outcomes in children.Methods: Participants were children aged 7–11 years and their primary

caregivers (n = 158), recruited from primary schools across South Australia.Children completed measures of parenting style, self-esteem, and body dissat-isfaction, and had their weight and height objectively measured. Parentscompleted measures of body dissatisfaction and depressive symptoms, andreported on their education. Regression analyses investigated associationsbetween perceived parenting style, child weight, and outcomes of child self-esteem and body image.Results: Larger child body mass index (BMI) was negatively associated with

child self-esteem and positively associated with child body dissatisfaction.Parental responsiveness was positively associated with child self-esteem, butparenting was not associated with child body dissatisfaction. Child weight andparenting styles were not found to interact in their association with childoutcomes.Conclusions: Higher child BMI was associated with higher bodydissatisfaction

and lower self-esteem in a young, non-treatment-seeking sample. A responsiveparenting style may assist in promoting child self-esteem, although it may notmitigate the association between excess weight and self-esteem in children.

The prevalence of childhood overweight and obesity hasincreased dramatically in developed countries over thepast three decades (Booth, Dobbins, Okely, Denney-Wilson, & Hardy, 2007; Lobstein, Baur, & Uauy, 2004).Low self-esteem, poor body image, and disorderedeating have been regularly identified as consequences ofoverweight and obesity (Gibson et al., 2008). In fact,the psychosocial consequences of obesity have beensuggested to be more widespread for children thanphysical consequences such as diabetes, hypertension,and growth problems (Dietz, 1998; Lobstein et al.,2004). Parenting has long been identified as an impor-tant part of the weight-related environment of youngchildren (Davison & Birch, 2001) and has been shown

Key Points

1 Increased weight is associated with body dissatisfac-tion and low self-esteem in young children.

2 Body dissatisfaction in children may not be associ-ated with general parenting behaviours such asparenting style.

3 Encouraging parental responsiveness may help topromote positive self-esteem in children.

Funding source: The present work was funded by a CSIROPreventative Health Flagship Top-Up Scholarship award. Noconflict of interest is anticipated.Conflict of interest: None.

Clinical Psychologist 16 (2012) 25–35

© 2012 The Australian Psychological Society 25

to influence psychosocial outcomes in young children(Maccoby & Martin, 1983). Treatment and preventionprogrammes for overweight and obesity often involveparents but tend to focus on changing child weight orweight-related behaviours without taking into accountpsychological outcomes that may be associated withoverweight. It has been suggested that psychological dif-ficulties may impede the progress of weight-lossattempts (Haines, Neumark-Sztainer, Wall, & Story,2007); thus, developing a better understanding of therelationships between parenting, child weight, and childwell-being may also offer insights into strategies forincreasing the effectiveness of obesity prevention andremediation efforts.

Two aspects of psychological functioning that havebeen regularly associated with child weight are body dis-satisfaction and self-esteem. Increased weight has beenconsistently associated with body dissatisfaction in chil-dren (Anschutz, Kanters, Van Strien, Vermulst, & Engels,2009; Clark & Tiggemann, 2007), while a recent reviewof research into self-esteem in obese children andadolescents concluded that strong evidence exists tosuggest that childhood obesity impairs global self-esteem(Griffiths, Parsons, & Hill, 2010). Both low self-esteemand body dissatisfaction have been found to correlatewith higher levels of unhealthy weight-control behav-iours or risk for the development of eating disordersin adolescence (Erickson, Hahn-Smith, & Smith, 2009;Neumark-Sztainer, Paxton, Hannan, Haines, & Story,2006). Identifying aspects of the child’s environmentthat may help to promote healthy weight-relatedpsychological outcomes may therefore also help toprevent the development of more serious weight-relatedpsychological sequelae as the child becomes older.

Children develop in the context of multiple levels ofinteracting environmental factors including the family,the physical environment, and the broader social context(Brofenbrenner, 1992). For young children, the familialenvironment and, more specifically, parents represent astrong influencing factor for a range of outcomes, includ-ing but not limited to weight, weight-related behaviours,and psychological well-being (Davison & Birch, 2001;Maccoby & Martin, 1983). When parents are able to meetchildren’s needs for support and affection, and providethem with appropriate levels of structure, children arewell placed for positive developmental outcomes(Maccoby & Martin, 1983). Stable individual differencesin parenting have been referred to as “parenting style,”which consists of two dimensions: demandingness andresponsiveness (Baumrind, 1971; Maccoby & Martin,1983). Demandingness refers to the extent to whichparents place limitations and boundaries on their chil-dren’s behaviour and are willing to confront the child

who disobeys (Baumrind, 1991). Responsiveness relatesto parents’ tendency to be attuned and responsive to theirchildren’s needs and demands (Baumrind, 1991). Therelationship between parenting style and child diet, activ-ity, and weight is well studied, with (both cross-sectionaland longitudinal) findings generally suggesting thathigher levels of parental demandingness and higherlevels of responsiveness are associated with healthyweight-related outcomes in children (Berge, 2009; Rhee,2008; Sleddens, Gerards, Thijs, de Vries, & Kremers,2011).

Differences in childhood self-esteem have been foundto correlate with parenting style, with higher levels ofdemandingness and responsiveness associated withhigher self-esteem in children (Heaven & Ciarrochi,2008; McClure, Tanski, Kingsbury, Gerrard, & Sargent,2010). The relationship between parenting style, childweight, and child self-esteem has not, however, receivedattention in the literature. This is surprising because bothparenting style and increased child weight have beenfound to be associated with self-esteem in children (Grif-fiths et al., 2010). Parents are uniquely placed in terms oftheir ability to influence both weight-related behavioursand psychological outcomes in their children, particularlyduring the pre-adolescent years. The emotional andbehavioural environment they provide for their childthrough their parenting style may therefore influencethe relationship between child weight and child psycho-logical outcomes such as self-esteem and body imagedissatisfaction.

Most previous investigations into parental influenceon child body image have focused on specific parentalbehaviours or attributes such as parents’ own drive forthinness and comments about the child’s weight (Ans-chutz et al., 2009; Buri, 1989; Kluck, 2010). One studydid find that retrospective recollections of maternalcontrol (i.e., mothers’ attempts to control child behav-iour) were negatively associated with body satisfactionin college-aged women (Sira & White, 2010), while twofound a cross-sectional but not longitudinal associationbetween family “connectedness” and body satisfactionin adolescent girls (Archibald, Graber, & Brooks-Gunn,1999; Byely, Archibald, Graber, & Brooks-Gunn, 2000).Paternal authoritativeness (high demandingness, highresponsiveness) has also been found to be negativelyassociated with drive for thinness and body dissatisfac-tion in adolescents undergoing treatment for anorexianervosa (Enten & Golan, 2009). The relationshipbetween parenting style and body dissatisfaction inchildren, however, remains unstudied. Given thatassociations have been found between parenting styleand body image in adolescents, one would expectthat in children, for whom parents exert a stronger

Taylor et al.

© 2012 The Australian Psychological Society26

influence on the environment, the relationship betweenparenting and child body image may be stronger thanthat found for adolescents. Many prevention and inter-vention programmes for child overweight and obesitythat involve parents tend to focus on younger childrenrather than adolescents (Golan, 2006; Golley, Magarey,Baur, Steinbeck, & Daniels, 2007). Studying the influ-ence of parenting style on the relationship betweenchild weight, self-esteem, and body dissatisfaction willhelp to ensure that recommendations regarding parent-ing style, which are regularly included in programmestargeting child overweight and obesity, also serve topromote positive psychological outcomes in youngchildren.

The preponderance of studies investigating associationsbetween parenting style and child outcomes have used aparent-report method of measurement. This is despitefindings that child-perceived parenting demonstratedsignificantly stronger associations with child body dis-satisfaction and dieting behaviour (Haines, Neumark-Sztainer, Hannan, & Robinson-O’Brien, 2008), and withobserved parenting (Sessa, Avenevoli, Steinberg, &Morris, 2001), compared with the parents’ own perspec-tive of their parenting. A recent study also found thatchild-reported parenting style was associated with chil-dren’s attitudes towards diet and activity, whereasparent-reported parenting style was not (Taylor, Wilson,Slater, & Mohr, 2011). It appears, therefore, that for childoutcomes, it is the parenting that children experiencethat is important rather than parents’ perspective of theirown behaviour.

The present study was designed to investigate therelationship between parenting style, as perceived bythe child, and child outcomes, weight, self-esteem, andbody dissatisfaction. Given that findings of previousstudies suggest that parental responsiveness anddemandingness are associated with positive psychologi-cal outcomes for children (e.g., Baumrind, 1991), it wasexpected that parental responsiveness and demanding-ness would be positively associated with child self-esteem and negatively associated with child bodydissatisfaction. Secondly, it was predicted that childbody mass index (BMI) would be positively associatedwith child body dissatisfaction and negatively associatedwith child self-esteem. It was also expected that parent-ing would moderate the association between child BMIand psychological outcomes, with higher levels ofresponsiveness and higher levels of demandingnessassociated with a weakening of the relationship be-tween BMI and problematic psychological outcomes,suggesting that responsiveness and demandingness inparents are protective factors against the developmentof weight-related negative psychological outcomes.

Method

Participants

Participants were children aged between 7 and 11 yearsfrom 10 primary schools across South Australia, and theirprimary caregivers. Information sheets about the studyand consent forms were sent out to all students in grades3, 4, and 5 at those schools (total: 1,251). In response tothese, 233 primary caregivers consented for themselvesand their child to participate. Children completed ques-tionnaires in relation to perceived parenting style, bodyimage, and self-esteem at school in class and had theirweight and height measured by study researchers, fromwhich data BMI was calculated (defined as weight (kg)/height (m)2). Questionnaires that included measures ofparental depressive symptoms, body image, and self-reported height and weight were sent directly to parents,and 190 parents returned completed questionnaires, pro-viding a response rate of 82%. Fifteen children wereabsent on the day of data collection, and 17 parents failedto provide data on parental psychological outcomes,resulting in a final sample size of 158.

Measures

Child-perceived parenting style

Children reported on parenting style using the Authori-tative Parenting Index (Jackson, Henriksen, & Foshee,1998). This consists of two scales measuring the dimen-sions that comprise the most widely studied conceptu-alisation of parenting style, namely responsiveness, themeasure of which comprises nine items (e.g., “He/shecomforts me when I am upset”), and demandingness, themeasure of which comprises seven items (e.g., “He/shehas rules that I must follow”). Children were asked torelate responses to the parent who spends the mostamount of time looking after them (i.e., their primarycaregiver). Response options were on a 4-point Likert-type scale ranging from 1 (not like my parent) to 4 (exactlylike my parent). Internal consistency (Cronbach’s alpha)values for this scale have been found to be adequate,with ranges of a = 0.67–76 for the responsiveness scaleand a = 0.67–0.88 for the demandingness scale (Botello-Harbaum, Nansel, Haynie, Iannotti, & Simons-morton,2008; Nansel et al., 2009). One item (“He/she tells mewhat to do” (reverse-coded)) was removed from theperceived parental responsiveness scale because of lowitem-total correlation.

Child BMI

Objective height (to the nearest 0.5 cm) and weight (tothe nearest 100 g) measurements of children were taken.

Self-esteem and body dissatisfaction among children


Both were taken by trained researchers, and childrenwore light clothing and no shoes for the measurements.BMI was calculated from these height and weightmeasurements.

Child self-esteem

Sixteen items were taken from the Self-DescriptionQuestionnaire (SDQ; Marsh, Craven, & Debus, 1991) toprovide a measure of child self-esteem. This measure wasdeveloped in Australia and has been used widely withchildren in the primary school years. The items used forthe current study represented the peer-related (e.g.,“Other kids want me to be their friend”) and generalself-esteem (e.g., “I like being the way I am”) scales of theSDQ, which have been found to exhibit good reliability insamples of young children, with internal consistency esti-mates ranging from a = 0.72–0.81 (Marsh et al., 1991).Responses for all items on the SDQ were given on a5-point Likert-type scale, with options ranging from 1(no, not at all) to 5 (yes, a lot). A factor analysis of the itemswas conducted because these two scales have not previ-ously been used as a stand-alone measure. This revealedthe presence of a single factor explaining 40.1% of thevariance on the items, determined through inspection ofthe scree plot and confirmed through the Monte Carloparallel analysis (Horn, 1965).

Child body dissatisfaction

Collins’s (1991) sex-specific figure rating scales wereused to assess child body dissatisfaction. This measureconsisted of two arrays of seven figures ranging from veryunderweight to obese. Children rated their perceivedcurrent size on a line presented underneath the figures(i.e., “Put a mark on the line under the picture that mostlooks like how you think your body looks right now”).Under the second array of figures, children gave a ratingof ideal size (i.e., “Put a mark on the line under thepicture that looks most like how you would like yourbody to look”). Children were told to place a mark on theline between two pictures if they felt their perceived orideal size fell between two specific pictures on the scale.Actual and ideal ratings were calculated by measuring tothe nearest millimetre from the beginning of the scale tothe point at which the child placed the mark. This pro-duced a linearly defined variable in which higher valuesrepresented desire for a thinner body. Body dissatisfac-tion is therefore, in the context of the present study,represented by an endorsement of an ideal body that isthinner than a child’s perceived current body size.

Covariates

Children gave details of their gender and age. Parentsprovided information on their education level achieved,as a proxy for socio-economic status. Response optionsfor parental education ranged from 1 (primary school) to 9(postgraduate degree). Because socio-economic status andchild gender have been associated with child weight andchild psychological outcomes (Collins, 1991; Lobsteinet al., 2004), these variables were included in all analysesas covariates.

Parental body dissatisfaction. Because parental body dissat-isfaction has been associated with child body dissatisfac-tion, parents completed a measure of body dissatisfactionusing Gardner’s figure rating scale (Gardner, Jappe, &Gardner, 2009). This consists of two arrays of 17 figuresranging from very underweight to very overweightunder which parents placed an estimation of currentbody size (first figure array) and an estimation of idealbody size (second figure array). The body images werebased upon anthropometric measurements of US adults,with the centre figure representing average body size andfigures on either side of the centre figure ranging from60% of average size to 140% of average size (Gardneret al., 2009). Body dissatisfaction was calculated by sub-tracting the ideal body size rating from the current bodysize rating. Higher levels on the resultant variable there-fore represented desire for a smaller body.

Parental depressive symptoms. A measure of parentaldepressive symptoms was taken from the DepressionAnxiety and Stress Scale (DASS-21; Lovibond & Lovi-bond, 1995). This measure was included because parentalpsychological functioning has been associated withparenting and with psychological outcomes in children(Berg-Nielsen, Vikan, & Dahl, 2002). The DASS-21 is avalidated short-form questionnaire for symptoms ofdepression, anxiety, and stress over the past 7 days. Ithas been shown to demonstrate good reliability inadult samples (a = 0.97; Antony, Cox, Enns, Bieling, &Swinson, 1998), and the depression subscale has beenfound to correlate highly with comprehensive measuresof depressive symptoms (Lovibond & Lovibond, 1995).The depression scale consists of seven items (e.g., “I feltdownhearted and blue”), and responses were given on a4-point Likert-type scale ranging from 0 (did not apply tome at all) to 3 (applied to me very much or most of the time).

Statistical analysis

All analyses were conducted using PASW Statistics,version 18.0.0 (SPSS Inc., Chicago, IL, 2009). Inspection

Taylor et al.


of the parenting style dimensions indicated the presenceof positive skew, which was corrected using a logarithmictransformation. Standardised BMI scores (z-scores),adjusted for age and gender using International Taskforceon Obesity criteria (Cole, Bellizzi, Flegal, & Dietz, 2000),were calculated for child BMI and used in all analyses.

Simultaneous multiple regression analyses were con-ducted to determine the relative influence of childweight, parenting, and covariates on the outcomes ofchild self-esteem and body dissatisfaction. In order tocontrol for the influence of parents’ own psychologicalfunctioning on child psychological outcomes, parents’own body image and depressive symptoms were includedas covariates for analyses involving child body dissatis-faction and child self-esteem, respectively, along withchild gender and parental education.

Moderated regression analyses were also conducted forthe interaction between child BMI and each parentingstyle dimension. These followed the procedures outlinedby Baron and Kenny (1986). Variables were first centred,and a product term was calculated from the centred vari-ables. The product variables for BMI and each parentingstyle dimension were entered simultaneously into thesecond step of a regression analysis as recommended byFrazier, Tix, and Barron (2004), with the centred predic-tors and covariates entered into the first step, allowingthe unique influence of the interactions on the outcometo be determined. For moderation to be confirmed, asignificant change in the regression coefficient needed tooccur at the second step, when the interaction termswere entered. The criterion for statistical significance forall analyses was set at p < .05.

Results

Descriptive statistics for children and parents of thesample are presented in Table 1. The proportion of chil-dren who were overweight or obese in the presentsample according to International Taskforce on Obesitystandards (Cole et al., 2000) was slightly lower than Aus-tralian prevalence estimates (22.7% compared with25.3%; Booth et al., 2007). The parents of the samplewere highly educated, with 70% having completed someform of tertiary education (Technical and Further Educa-tion (TAFE) certificate or higher). Both children andparents’ ideal body rating was significantly smaller thantheir current perceived body size, t(232) = 7.15, p < .001and t(186) = 12.37, p < .001, respectively.

There were no gender differences in child BMI z-scoreor child self-esteem. Body dissatisfaction also did notdiffer according to child gender, but girls showed a trendtowards perceiving their current size as significantly

larger than did boys, t(231) = 2.00, p = .05. There was nosignificant correlation between child self-esteem andchild body dissatisfaction.

All measures used in the study showed adequate reli-ability, with Cronbach’s alpha values of a = 0.71 for therevised child-perceived responsiveness scale, a = 0.69for child-perceived demandingness, a = 0.91 for thechild self-esteem scale, and a = 0.82 for the DASS-21depression scale.

Table 2 presents the zero-order correlations for thestudy variables. Associations were shown between childBMI and both child self-esteem and child body dissatis-faction. Child-perceived parenting variables were alsoassociated with child self-esteem but not with child bodydissatisfaction.

Self-esteem

Child self-esteem was regressed onto child-reportedparental responsiveness and demandingness, along withcovariates child BMI, child gender, parent education, andparent depressive symptoms. The results are presentedin Table 3. Parental responsiveness and child BMI weresignificant unique predictors of child self-esteem. Moder-ated hierarchical regression analyses were subsequently

Table 1 Descriptive statistics for parent and child characteristics

Respondent variable Mean or % Standard

deviation

Child

N (% female) 233 (52.8%)

Age 9.28 1.09

Body mass index 17.94 2.74

% overweight/obese 22.7%

Perceived parental responsiveness

(range 8–32)

20.21 3.00

Perceived parental demandingness

(range 7–28)

22.24 3.73

Self-esteem (range 16–80) 65.76 9.95

Current body size (range 0–20) 8.15 2.55

Ideal body size (range 0–20) 7.05 2.46

Body dissatisfaction 1.19 2.10

Parent

N (% female) 190 (91.1%)

Age 40.69 5.65

Education %

<Year 12 15.7

Year 12 or equivalent 13.6

Tertiary 70.7

Depressive symptoms (range 0–21) 3.97 5.21

Current body size (range 0–27) 10.64 6.23

Ideal body size (range 0–27) 6.89 4.10

Body dissatisfaction 3.75 4.14



conducted; these indicated that neither parenting styledimension interacted significantly with child BMI in itsassociation with child self-esteem.

Body dissatisfaction

Table 4 presents the results of the regression analysis forchild body dissatisfaction. Only child BMI was signifi-cantly associated with child body dissatisfaction. No sig-nificant interaction was shown between perceivedparental demandingness and child BMI or between per-ceived responsiveness and child BMI in predicting childbody dissatisfaction.

Discussion

The present study investigated the relationship of parent-ing style and child weight to child self-esteem and body

dissatisfaction, two aspects of psychological functioningcommonly associated with overweight and obesity. Thefindings suggest that both child BMI and parental respon-siveness are associated with aspects of child psychologicalfunctioning.

Child BMI was negatively associated with child self-esteem and positively associated with child body dissat-isfaction in the present sample, providing furtherevidence for the existence of an association betweenexcess weight and poorer psychological functioning inpre-teen children. The relationship between excessweight and body dissatisfaction is well established, evenin young children (Clark & Tiggemann, 2008; Dohnt &Tiggemann, 2006). Earlier studies suggested that weight-related influences on self-esteem might not occur until achild reaches teenage years (Strauss, 2000), but morerecent studies have suggested that younger children withexcess weight also experience difficulties with self-esteem

Table 2 Zero-order correlations between parenting, child body mass index z-score (BMIz), child self-esteem and body dissatisfaction (BD), and covariates

(n = 158)

Child

self-esteem

Child

BD

Child

BMIz

Child-reported

responsiveness

Child-reported

demandingness

Child

age

Parent

education

Parent

depression

Parent

BD

Child BD -0.09 — — — — — — — —

Child BMIz -0.19* 0.43** — — — — — — —

Child-reported responsiveness 0.39** -0.07 -0.06 — — — — — —

Child-reported

demandingness

0.24** -0.01 0.01 0.37** — — — —

Child age -0.05 -0.04 0.20* 0.03 -0.10 — — — —

Parent education 0.02 -0.10 -0.06 0.19* 0.01 0.01 — — —

Parent depression -0.05 0.00 -0.04 -0.04 0.07 0.12 -0.01 — —

Parent BD -0.10 0.15 0.15 -0.07 -0.03 -0.05 -0.02 0.22** —

*p < .05, **p < .01.

Table 3 Results of regression analysis to predict child self-esteem

(n = 158)

B � SE Beta p-value

Child self-esteem

Step 1

R2 (8,146) = 0.20, p = .001

Child BMIz -1.75 0.73 -0.18 .018

Child gender -0.37 1.54 -0.02 .811

Child age -0.64 0.65 -0.08 .328

Parent education -0.29 0.35 -0.06 .399

Parent body dissatisfaction 0.09 0.18 -0.04 .611

Parent depression -0.24 0.60 -0.03 .693

Child-reported responsiveness 3.38 0.80 0.35 .000

Child-reported demandingness 1.03 0.84 0.10 .220

Step 2a

R2 change (2,144) = 0.00, p = .686

aStep 2: interaction terms (child BMIz ¥ child-report responsiveness and

child BMIz ¥ child-report demandingness).

BMIz, body mass index z-score.

Table 4 Results of regression analysis to predict child body dissatisfac-

tion (n = 158)

B � SE Beta p-value

Body dissatisfaction

Step 1

R2 (8,145) = 0.23, p < .001

Child BMIz 0.84 0.15 0.43 .000

Child gender 0.55 0.31 0.14 .077

Child age 0.10 0.13 0.06 .446

Parent education -0.07 0.07 -0.08 .296

Parent body dissatisfaction 0.03 0.04 0.07 .336

Parent depression -0.04 0.12 -0.03 .747

Child-reported responsiveness -0.08 0.16 -0.04 .636

Child-reported demandingness -0.05 0.17 -0.03 .758

Step 2a

R2 change (2,143) = 0.00 p = .678

aStep 2: interaction terms (child BMIz ¥ child-report responsiveness and

child BMIz ¥ child-report demandingness).

BMIz, body mass index z-score.

Taylor et al.


(Griffiths et al., 2010), with evidence for a causal rela-tionship between BMI and lower self-esteem (Hesketh,Wake, & Waters, 2004). The present findings indicate thatchildren as young as 7, who are not necessarily seekingtreatment for overweight or obesity, may be experiencinglower self-esteem associated with excess weight. Profes-sionals working with children who are overweight orobese should be attentive to the possibility that thesechildren are experiencing problems with psychologicalwell-being. Assuming that children are too young mayresult in professionals missing precursors to the develop-ment of unhealthy weight-control behaviours; both lowself-esteem and body image dissatisfaction have beenassociated with the development of eating disorders(Gibson et al., 2008; Sancho, Arija, Asorey, & Canals,2007).

The association between child-perceived parentingstyle and child self-esteem provided partial support to thestudy hypothesis. Parental responsiveness showed a posi-tive association with child self-esteem, whereas demand-ingness did not predict child self-esteem. Previous studieshave suggested that parental demandingness and respon-siveness promote self-esteem in children (McClure et al.,2010), but the findings of the present study indicate thatresponsiveness may be the more important aspect ofparenting style for associations with child self-esteem.Indeed, it has been found that low parental responsive-ness and high demandingness predicts low self-esteem inolder children (Heaven & Ciarrochi, 2008). It is possiblethat associations found between this type of parentingand low child self-esteem may be driven by a low level ofparental responsiveness rather than by parental demand-ingness, although further investigations are needed inorder to verify this. Child BMI and parental responsive-ness appear to be uniquely associated with child self-esteem; parenting may not mitigate the associationbetween weight and self-esteem, but both weight andparental responsiveness are important for self-esteem inchildren.

Parenting style was not associated with child bodyimage: only child BMI predicted child body dissatisfac-tion. Previous studies have investigated parental influ-ence on child body dissatisfaction and found specificparental behaviours and attitudes such as encourage-ment for the child to lose weight, comments about childweight, and parents’ own drive for thinness and dietingbehaviour to be associated with child body dissatisfac-tion (Anschutz et al., 2009; Davison & Birch, 2002;Haines et al., 2008; McCabe, Ricciardelli, & Holt, 2005).General parenting variables like demandingness andresponsiveness have been shown to be associated withbody dissatisfaction only in adolescents and young adultwomen (Archibald et al., 1999; Byely et al., 2000;

Enten & Golan, 2009). It may be that in younger chil-dren, specific practices and attitudes are more importantfor body satisfaction than is general parenting style.Recommendations regarding specific parenting behav-iours such as decreasing criticisms about child weightmay be more beneficial for promoting child body satis-faction than attempts to change parental responsivenessor demandingness.

Parents’ own psychological concerns and affectivefunctioning (body dissatisfaction and depressive symp-toms) were not found to be associated with body imageor self-esteem in children. Body dissatisfaction inmothers has previously been found to be associatedwith daughters’ dissatisfaction (Smolak, 2004), althoughother studies have found evidence for associations withovert parental behaviours only (e.g., comments aboutweight) and not for factors such as parents’ own bodydissatisfaction or dieting (Haines et al., 2008). Thepresent findings showed support for the latter sugges-tion, as parental behaviours, in terms of a responsiveparenting style, were associated with child self-esteem,while internal factors such as parents’ own depressivesymptoms and body dissatisfaction were not associatedwith child outcomes.

Child gender, child age, and parental education werenot significantly associated with child self-esteem or bodydissatisfaction. Although no gender differences wereshown in either BMI or absolute body dissatisfaction,girls perceived their current body shape to be larger thanboys did. It is the case that the images used for the studywere an artist’s interpretation of body size rather thanbased upon standardised body size images; thus, the dif-ference may be a function of measurement error (i.e.,deviations in body size on figure arrays may not havebeen equal across genders). Further investigation usingstandardised images is therefore warranted. It is also pos-sible that girls’ perceptions are influenced by societalthinness ideals to a greater extent than boys. Girls asyoung as 5 years have been found to be influenced bymedia messages regarding weight (Dohnt & Tiggemann,2006), and internalisation of this “thin ideal” may lead tomisperception of own body size.

Overall, findings support the view that parentalresponsiveness appears to be an important target forfacilitating positive self-esteem in children, includingoverweight and obese children. Previous studies haveshown responsiveness to be associated with healthybehaviours such as increased fruit intake (Berge, Wall,Loth, & Neumark-Sztainer, 2010; Kremers, Brug, DeVries, & Engels, 2003) and increased engagement inphysical activity (Jago et al., 2011). Parental demanding-ness was not found in the present study to be associatedwith child psychological outcomes, but it has previously



been suggested that demandingness in the absence ofresponsiveness produces negative influences on childself-esteem (Heaven & Ciarrochi, 2008), and it has beenassociated with eating disorder symptoms (Enten &Golan, 2009). This type of parenting has also been foundto predict increased child weight, relative to a parentingstyle characterised by high levels of both demandingnessand responsiveness (Rhee, Lumeng, Appugliese, Kaciroti,& Bradley, 2006). The current study highlights the impor-tant role responsive parenting plays in supporting posi-tive self-concept among children, particularly those atrisk because of excess weight. Interventions aiming atreducing child weight, or those designed to assist over-weight children deal with the negative psychologicalsequelae of weight gain, could usefully focus on encour-aging parental responsiveness to their children. Althoughfurther research is required, it is possible that parentalsupport of children’s self-esteem may mitigate child riskof eating disorders or other unhealthy compensatorybehaviours.

Strengths of the present study include the focus onmultiple aspects of child psychological well-being. Themeasurement of parenting style through child reportrather than self-report was also a strength, as it hasbeen found to be more strongly associated with childoutcomes (Haines et al., 2008) and also more closelyassociated with observed parenting style compared withparent-reported parenting style (Sessa et al., 2001).Limitations in study interpretation arise from the cross-sectional nature of the study and the associated diffi-culty with the attribution of causality. While it would beexpected that parenting and child weight influence psy-chological outcomes, it is also possible that low self-esteem and poor body image may be contributing tooverweight and may induce a change in parenting style.Nevertheless, the result indicates the importance oflongitudinal cohort data collection that tracks how self-esteem develops in obese and overweight children inhouseholds with more or less responsive parents. Objec-tive measures of parenting are also needed to verify thefindings for parental responsiveness, given that theywere based upon proxy reports of parenting. The use ofsingle-dimensional scales for body image and self-esteem may have underestimated effects, as there issome evidence to suggest that both outcomes involvemultiple dimensions (Griffiths et al., 2010; Smolak,2004). In providing estimations of parenting style, chil-dren did not identify the gender of who they consideredto be the primary caregiver. For families in which thegender of the primary caregiver identified by the childdiffered from the gender of the parent-identifiedprimary caregiver, this may have influenced the find-ings for associations between parent and child body

dissatisfaction, which could provide a potential expla-nation for the null findings for this relationship. Finally,the small sample size, particularly given over 1,000people were initially approached to participate, limitsthe generalisability of the findings. It cannot be ruledout that characteristics specific to the present samplemay have influenced the results of the study.

Longitudinal studies are also needed in order to elu-cidate the nature of the relationship between parenting,child weight, and child psychological outcomes suchas self-esteem and the risk for the development ofunhealthy weight-control behaviours. Studies in thearea of parenting and child feeding have found thatparenting styles are associated with specific feedingpractices, which, in turn, may influence child outcomes(Hubbs-Tait, Kennedy, Page, Topham, & Harrist, 2008).Investigating how parenting styles may map onto spe-cific practices related to such outcomes as body imageand self-esteem may also help to clarify understandingof these relationships. For example, specific parentalbehaviours such as encouragement of dieting or criti-cism about weight have been found to be associatedwith drive for thinness and disordered eating in chil-dren (Haines et al., 2008; Kluck, 2010). It is possiblethat parenting styles may predict these parent behav-iours, thus informing us of the processes by whichparenting styles may influence weight-related psycho-logical outcomes in children. Finally, it would be usefulto investigate the relationship between parenting styleand unhealthy weight-control behaviours in children inorder to identify whether parental responsiveness mayhelp to mitigate the onset of eating disorder symptoms,as studies to date have focused on populations alreadyundergoing treatment for eating disorders (e.g., Enten &Golan, 2009).

The present study provides further evidence that childweight is associated with negative psychological out-comes in young, non-treatment-seeking children. Psy-chologists should ensure that they are cognisant of thepotential negative impacts of weight and the strategiesthat parents use when responding to their child’s con-cerns (i.e., their responsiveness) when consulting withchildren who are overweight and obese. It appears thatparents are able to have a positive influence on childweight-related psychological outcomes through ensuringthey are involved with their children and responsive totheir needs. Emphasising a responsive parenting styleis particularly important as it is associated with bothhealthy weight-related behaviours, such as fruit and veg-etable intake (Berge et al., 2010), and positive psycho-logical outcomes in children, something that might notbe achieved solely through changing specific weight-related parenting practices.

Taylor et al.


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