Rising prevalence of child and adolescent obesity worldwide poses a threat to the future health and wellbeing of individuals. A better understanding of the mechanisms involved in the regulation of energy balance and therefore energy intake should help devise dietary strategies conducive to the maintenance of a healthy bodyweight during growth. Indeed, eating habits established during childhood are powerful determinants of future food preferences and choices in adulthood. Appetite for food and calorie-containing drinks is an important driver of energy intake and is modulated by a variety of environmental, psychological and metabolic factors. For instance, macronutrient manipulation and particularly increasing the protein content of meals at the expense of carbohydrates has been previously shown to reduce appetite in adults. Less research has been carried out in children due to methodological limitations. The first study described in this thesis sought to establish whether salivary sampling could be a non-invasive alternative to intra-venous blood sampling for the quantification of an appetite inducing peptide called ghrelin. Chapter 4 describes the dietary habits of a cohort of children (8-10 years old) and adolescents (13-17 years old) with a specific focus on sugar consumption and a comparison of key dietary characteristics with the Scottish Dietary Goals and with data from national dietary surveillance programmes. Subsequently, chapter 5 assesses the effect of protein content and portion size of dairy breakfast drinks in children and adolescents on appetite and caloric intake at an ad libitum snack buffet in a randomised crossover design study. Differences between age groups, nutritional status and genders were examined. Chapter 6 examines the correlations between performance at cognitive tests of executive function and ad libitum snack intake and chapter 7 presents new avenues of research into appetite in children and adolescents.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:715491 |
| Date | January 2017 |
| Creators | Buosi, William |
| Publisher | University of Aberdeen |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Source | http://digitool.abdn.ac.uk:80/webclient/DeliveryManager?pid=232270 |
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