Size matters: exploring the links between food portion sizes and diet quality in Irish children

Abstract

Food portions have increased over the last 20 years. This has been shown to be true for the foods we eat at home, those consumed at restaurants and fast-food outlets, and for foods sold in packages. Along with this increase in food portion sizes has been an increase in both child and adult obesity, leading to the obvious question: could larger food portion sizes be contributing to the obesity epidemic? The World Health Organisation (WHO) has cited large portion sizes as a ‘possible’ dietary risk factor for obesity, which according to their definition means that ‘more trials are needed to support the tentative associations’. Their caution is based on the fact that the evidence comes mainly from cross-sectional studies, which typically include a large number of individuals but are essentially observational, and therefore cannot conclude that the relationship between large portion sizes and obesity is a causative one. The WHO ...