Binge-eating a problem for some overweight kids

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Overweight children who are prone to binge-eating can down hundreds more calories at a sitting than their peers, yet still feel hungry again soon after, a new study shows.

Researchers found that of 60 overweight 6- to 12-year-olds, those who said they’d ever binged before were more likely to overeat at a lunch buffet. Yet, the study found, these same children got hungry again more than an hour sooner than their peers.

The findings, reported in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, suggest that out-of-control eating and a reduced sensitivity to fullness are feeding the weight woes of some children. 

"Children who report binge-eating behaviors appear to have deficits in appetite regulation that put them at risk for the development of obesity,” write Margaret C. Mirch of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development in Bethesda, Maryland, and colleagues.

Research shows that up to 30 percent of overweight children binge on occasion—eating large amounts of food with a sense of being out of control.

Of the 60 children in the current study, 10 said they’d ever had a bingeing “episode.” When the researchers presented the children with an all-you-can-eat lunch buffet, those 10 children downed 400 to 600 calories more than their overweight, but non-bingeing, peers.

What’s more, they were ready to eat again about an hour sooner.

It’s possible, according to the researchers, that children with binge-eating problems respond more to external “cues”—like the sight and smell of food—than to physiological hunger signals.

They may also be prone to emotional eating, where people try to offset anger, sadness or other feelings by using food.

If so, Mirch and her colleagues note, teaching children how to recognize and respond to only true hunger signals may help them avoid binges and control their weight.

SOURCE: American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, November 2006. 

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