Parents' perceptions and concerns about their children's weight

<b>Background:</b> For parents to address overweight or obesity in their children, they first need to perceive their child to be overweight and to show some level of concern. We aimed to: (1) measure the level of misclassification between children’s actual and parent-perceived weight status, and (2) determine the level of parent concern about their child’s (actual) weight and whether concern varied according to the accuracy of parents’ perceptions.<br /><br /><b>Methods:</b> Participants were 1711 primary school children aged 5–12 years from the Barwon-South West region of Victoria, Australia. Height and weight were measured and weight status determined using international standards. Parents completed a Computer Assisted Telephone Interview (CATI) that included questions relating to their child’s weight.<br /><br /><b>Results:</b> 448 children (26.2% of sample) were overweight or obese. Of these, weight status for almost half (48%) was underestimated by parents. This ‘bias’ did not vary according to the child’s gender, parent’s education, or household socio-economic status but did for child’s age and parent-respondent gender. More than half (57%) of the parents of overweight-obese children expressed no concern about their child’s weight. Parents who underestimated the weight status of their overweight child were significantly less concerned (P < 0.001) about their child’s weight than those who correctly perceived their child as overweight.<br /><br /><b>Conclusions:</b> Parents were relatively poor judges of overweight or obesity in their own child and consequently there was a lack of appropriately directed concern. Education to help parents correctly classify their child’s weight status should be part of efforts to prevent unhealthy weight gain.<br />