This infographic from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine features data from their report, Examining a Developmental Approach to Childhood Obesity: The Fetal and Early Childhood Years: Workshop Summary.
Recent scientific evidence points to the origins of childhood obesity as an outcome of the dynamic interplay of genetic, behavioral, and environmental factors throughout early development, with a compelling body of evidence suggesting that both maternal and paternal nutritional and other exposures affect a child’s risk of later obesity. The burgeoning field of epigenetics has led researchers to speculate that many of the observed associations between early developmental exposures and later risk of childhood obesity are mediated, at least in part, through epigenetic mechanisms.