Teen Having a Healthy Breakfast (© Abimages | Dreamstime.com)

You’ve probably heard it many times, maybe from your mom, “Breakfast is the most important meal of the day.” Well, mom was right and there’s scientific evidence to back her up. Unfortunately, breakfast-eating frequency declines through adolescence when developing bodies and minds really need the benefits of healthy eating.

Teens should know that besides causing them to miss out on important nutrients, skipping breakfast can lead to getting fat. Project EAT (Eating Among Teens) was a 5-year study of eating patterns and weight concerns among adolescents conducted by the Division of Epidemiology and Community Health at the University of Minnesota. The scientists performing the study found that adolescents who ate breakfast daily had lower Body Mass Indexes than those who never or occasionally ate breakfast. Their findings were published in Pediatrics, the official journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

There is speculation that after having no breakfast, many teens more than make up for those calories later in the day by snacking and binging, often on junk foods loaded with unhealthy fats.

If you’d like to read the article in Pediatrics cited above go to: Breakfast Eating and Weight Change in a 5-Year Prospective Analysis of Adolescents: Project EAT (Eating Among Teens)

To view a previous post on the topic of teens & healthy eating go to: Keeping It Healthy