Combo-Snacks of Cheese and Vegetables Cut Kids Calories, Study Suggests

'Cause they hate it.

Almost everyone is familiar with the alarming trend of childhood obesity. 32% of U.S. children are overweight or obese according to the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. One of the many factors leading to the obesity epidemic is increased snacking in children.

Today children eat around three snacks daily while thirty years ago they ate only one.

Parents want to ensure that their children snack healthfully, but restricting or limiting children's snacking can backfire. Children in homes where parents carefully regulate snacking were found to eat more unhealthy snacks in an unregulated environment than children with less restrictive parents.

Researchers Brian Wansink, Ph.D., Mitsuru Shimizu, Ph.D., and Adam Brumberg set out to discover whether certain types of snacks would lead children to feel full while consuming fewer calories. 201 students in the third through sixth grade were given either a plate of potato chips, a plate of vegetables, a plate of cheese, or a plate of vegetables and cheese while watching some of their favorite afterschool cartoons. They were asked about their fullness at the beginning of the experiment, after watching one episode of a cartoon, and again after watching a second episode of a cartoon.

And when they were away from the researchers, what did they eat?

No data.

I wonder why...