Mastication in overweight and obese children: A comparative cross-sectional study

Objective: The objective of this study was to analyze masticatory characteristics in children from 7 to 10 years, and to compare these characteristics among normal weight, overweight and obese children.Methods: This is a cross-sectional study, conducted in northeast Brazil, with a sample of 160 chil-dren, aged 7 to 10 years. The authors evaluated: nutritional and dental status; food intake; masti-catory parameters and orofacial myofunctional characteristics. The children were divided according to nutritional status into normal weight (n = 101), overweight (n = 33) and obesity (n = 26) groups.Results: The results showed that Obese children had a larger bite size (g) (median = 6.0, Q1 -Q3 = 4.0-9.0, p = 0.049) and performed fewer masticatory sequences (median = 3.0, Q1 -Q3 = 2.0-3.2, p = 0.024) than children with normal weight (median = 5.0, Q1-Q3 = 4.0-7.0; median = 4.0, Q1-Q3 = 3.0-5.0). Furthermore, obese children finished feeding in a shorter time (s) (median = 62.5, Q1-Q3 = 50.5-70.0, p = 0.039) than normal weight children (median = 66.0, Q1-Q3 = 56.5-78.0) and overweight children (median = 66.0, Q1-Q3 = 58.0-81.5).Conclusions: The present results suggest that obese children present changes in mastication, evidenced by larger bite-size, performing fewer masticatory sequences and rapid mastication, which may contribute to increased food consumption and the development of excess weight.(c) 2022 Sociedade Brasileira de Pediatria. Published by Elsevier Editora Ltda. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/ 4.0/).