DISCUSSION
This is the first study to examine how much food and what typesoffoodschildreneatwhilewatchingtelevision.Ourresults showthatchildrenconsumeasubstantialproportionoftheirdaily energy while watching television. Food consumption during televisionviewingdiffersbetweenweekenddaysandweekdays, and therefore weekend-weekday differences must be considered both in the design of studies of food consumption during television viewing and in the analysis of the data generated by such studies. On weekend days, more than one-quarter of the children’s daily energy was consumed during television viewing, and on weekdays, nearly 20% of daily energy was consumed during television viewing. These results were highly consistent across2qualitativelydifferentsamplesofchildren.Accordingly,
TABLE
Percentages of meals and snacks consumed during television viewing on weekdays and weekend days 1
Weekdays Weekend days
Third-grade sample %
Breakfast 23 37 37 49
Lunch 3 12 34 483
Dinner 45 47 34 484
Snacks
Fifth-grade sample 59 45 45 50
Breakfast 18 35 51 503
Lunch 9 25 25 432
Dinner 36 45 31 47
Snacks 67 43 39 492
eatingwhilewatchingtelevisionmaybeanimportantbehaviorto target in interventions designed to alter children’s overall food intake.
There were no significant differences between the fat content and energy density of foods consumed with the television on and those of foods consumed with the television off. This result is consistent with that of previous ecologic research in which no total nutrient differences were found between the overall diets of children who consumed 2 meals/d while watching television and those of their peers who consumed 2 meals/d watching television (7). However, in the present study, there were some differences in the relative energy contributions of some types of foods between times of television viewing and other times of the day.Specifically,inbothsamples,thepercentageofenergyfrom vegetables consumed during television viewing was significantly lower than that from vegetables consumed at other times during the day. Children’s preferences for vegetables are generallylow(28);thus,ifchildrenaregivenachoice,theymaybeless likely to choose vegetables over other foods. Furthermore,