Why teenage boys can clean out the family fridge
Source: Agencies |
June 17, 2010, Thursday
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Print Edition
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PARENTS of teenage boys now have evidence to back up the claim they could be eaten out of house and home with a United States study finding 14 to 17-year-old boys will eat a lunch of 2,000 calories given the chance.
Researchers from the US National Institute of Child Health and Human Development said teenage boys have a storied reputation for packing it away but there had actually been little objective evidence to confirm that this was the norm.
But in a lunch-buffet experiment involving 204 children ages eight to 17, researchers found boys routinely ate more compared than girls their own age and boys in their mid-teens were the most ravenous - downing an average lunch of nearly 2,000 calories.
Researcher Dr Jack A. Yanovski said the pattern made sense, given that boys usually hit their growth spurt - putting on height and muscle mass - in late puberty.
"There's a lot of folk wisdom that says boys can eat prodigious amounts, but we haven't had much data," Yanovski said as his study was published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
During two study lunches, the youngsters were told on one day to eat as much as they normally would during lunch and on the other day, to eat as much as they wanted.
Overall, the researchers found, boys ate more than girls.
Prepubescent boys between the ages of eight and 10 averaged nearly 1,300 lunchtime calories, versus 900 among prepubescent girls.
Girls showed the biggest increase in appetite during early to mid-puberty, roughly between the ages of 10 and 13. Girls that age averaged almost 1,300 lunchtime calories, and that figure was only slightly higher among girls who were in late puberty.
That pattern is in line with girls' development, Yanovski said, as they tend to have their most significant growth spurts in early to mid-puberty.
But boys tend to develop later and their calorie needs appear to shoot up significantly in late puberty, or between the ages of 14 and 17.
Researchers from the US National Institute of Child Health and Human Development said teenage boys have a storied reputation for packing it away but there had actually been little objective evidence to confirm that this was the norm.
But in a lunch-buffet experiment involving 204 children ages eight to 17, researchers found boys routinely ate more compared than girls their own age and boys in their mid-teens were the most ravenous - downing an average lunch of nearly 2,000 calories.
Researcher Dr Jack A. Yanovski said the pattern made sense, given that boys usually hit their growth spurt - putting on height and muscle mass - in late puberty.
"There's a lot of folk wisdom that says boys can eat prodigious amounts, but we haven't had much data," Yanovski said as his study was published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
During two study lunches, the youngsters were told on one day to eat as much as they normally would during lunch and on the other day, to eat as much as they wanted.
Overall, the researchers found, boys ate more than girls.
Prepubescent boys between the ages of eight and 10 averaged nearly 1,300 lunchtime calories, versus 900 among prepubescent girls.
Girls showed the biggest increase in appetite during early to mid-puberty, roughly between the ages of 10 and 13. Girls that age averaged almost 1,300 lunchtime calories, and that figure was only slightly higher among girls who were in late puberty.
That pattern is in line with girls' development, Yanovski said, as they tend to have their most significant growth spurts in early to mid-puberty.
But boys tend to develop later and their calorie needs appear to shoot up significantly in late puberty, or between the ages of 14 and 17.
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