Childhood obesity in Malta : a sociological perspective

Abstract

The 'obesity epidemic' (World Health Organization 2000) has been the subject of extensive cross disciplinary research. One barrage of statistics that proved to be a trigger for this study shows that the top ten countries for overweight thirteen year olds worldwide include five from the Mediterranean region (Currie et al. 2004b p.125). Malta's number one placing is of particular interest here. The purpose of this research is to add a sociological perspective to the academic discussion in its wake. It aims to highlight the 'invisible and unintended relationships' (Crossley 2004) that may hold between society and biology and to show that obesity is not simply something individuals 'have' but intrinsically linked to what they 'do'. It hopes to shift the focus of the debate from that of 'deviant bodies' to the social processes within which these are embedded by exploring the 'doings' in local culture that might have a direct or indirect influence on the physical and social process of embodiment in overweight children. A combination of predominantly qualitative research techniques are used to explore the values and attitudes that adults and children hold in respect to overweight children and the way that these influence affective dynamics, food and lifestyle choices. Data are analysed to explore the dynamic interplay of issues related to aesthetics, health and happiness as linked to the overweight body shape in children; to focus on what it means 'to be overweight and to have an overweight body' as a child growing up locally; and to highlight the way power dynamics in child-care strategies and negotiations influence parenting and nurturing techniques. Principal findings show that the goals and preoccupations mothers have in relation to their child's body shape and weight change dramatically with age:- while the overweight baby/toddler is considered 'cute', 'cuddly' and 'resistant to illness' - symbolic evidence of a successful ('happy') mother, this is effectively reversed by the time the child is about to leave primary school, aged ten, when the potential health problems associated with obesity (in adulthood) and the social sanctions the older child encounters under the influence of the 'slim is beautiful' become the mothers' main preoccupation. The children's perspective shows that while the idea that 'fat is ugly' is firmly established and frequently expressed by children in both age groups, the overweight five year olds seem unaware of their true weight status in contrast with the ten year olds who develop private coping strategies to gloss over the playground taunts. The grandmothers' powerful position as main and preferred source of childcare is clear in the data where the mothers' loss of control over the child's consumption of high calorie sweet treats is an accepted negative consequence in child care negotiations. The debate on causes for the high rate of obesity in Maltese children needs to acknowledge these social realities within which the trend is embedded and to address the essential paradox inherent in the 'medicalization' of obesity where the focus on individual 'solutions' tends to render the social environment that produced them invisible.