“Mommy-see, mommy-do”: perceptions of intergenerational “obesity” transmission among lower-income, higher-weight, rural midwestern American women

Abstract

Abstract Public health and media discourses frequently blame mothers for the size of their children, including parents coping with multiple structural disadvantages. Rural Midwestern American, low-income, self-identified higher-weight women (n = 25) participated in face-to-face, audio-recorded, semi-structured interviews about their beliefs regarding how body size is transmitted across generations. We analyzed interviews using causation coding. Participants facing socioeconomic and geographic barriers to salutogenic lifestyles de-emphasized genetic and epigenetic factors in body size. Instead, participants focused on parents’ role modeling, provision of “obesogenic” foods, and failure to enact protective behaviors like providing non-“obesogenic” foods and limiting children’s screen time. Findings demonstrate that the moralization of childhood “obesity” is pervasive, and these damaging discourses have been taken up among those facing socioeconomic disadvantage.