This February 24, 2017 study in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics Society concludes that adults who ate home cooked meals and didn’t watch television during meals had a lower incidence of obesity.
The study looked at over 12,000 Ohio Medicaid patients and surveyed them as to how much television they watched with meals and what they ate.
Those that never watched television or videos during family meals had 37% lower odds of obesity compared with those who always did (95% CI=0.54, 0.73), regardless of family meal frequency. Adults whose family meals were all home-cooked had 26% lower odds of obesity than those who ate some or no home-cooked family meals (95% CI=0.62, 0.88). This association was more pronounced among adults who ate few family meals.
The Main outcome measure of obesity was a body mass index [BMI] ≥30), calculated from self-reported height and weight.
