Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-v9fdk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-14T01:33:54.444Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Effects of parental stature on child stunting in India

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 July 2021

Amrita Gupta Open the ORCID record for Amrita Gupta [Opens in a new window] ,
John Cleland  and
T. V. Sekher
Amrita Gupta*
Affiliation:
Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, India
John Cleland
Affiliation:
London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London, UK
T. V. Sekher
Affiliation:
International Institute for Population Sciences, Mumbai, India
*
*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Adult heights in India are short. Child stunting remains high though the prevalence fell from 48% to 38% in the decade prior to 2016. This study assesses the links between parental height and child stunting using nationally representative data on 28,975 under-five-year-old children from the 2015–16 National Family Health Survey. Parental heights are represented as quintiles. Logistic regression was applied to estimate the effect of parental heights after adjustment for household wealth, parental schooling, place of residence and other covariates. The unadjusted estimates showed the effect on stunting to be similar for maternal height, wealth and education. In the multivariate analysis maternal height emerged as the strongest predictor of stunting, with adjusted odds of 2.85 for the shortest compared with the tallest quintile. The two other strong predictors of stunting were paternal height and wealth, with adjusted odds of close to 2.0 for the lowest quintile relative to the highest quintiles. In comparison, associations between stunting and other factors were minor, with the partial exception of mother’s education. The findings underscore the key role of intergenerational influences on stunting. Maternal height has a stronger association with childhood stunting than paternal height and socioeconomic influences such as education and household wealth. The influence of paternal height is also strong, equal in magnitude to household wealth. Health workers need to be alerted to the special needs of short women.

Keywords

Child stuntingParental heightsIntergenerational effects
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Biosocial Science , Volume 54 , Issue 4 , July 2022 , pp. 605 - 616
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Addo, OY, Stein, AD, Fall, CH, Gigante, DP, Guntupalli, AM, Horta, BL et al. (2013) Maternal height and child growth patterns. The Journal of Pediatrics 163(2), 549–554.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Black, RE, Allen, LH, Bhutta, ZA, Caulfield, LE, de Onis, M, Ezzati, M et al. (2008) Maternal and child undernutrition: global and regional exposures and health consequences. The Lancet 371(9608), 243–260.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Coffey, D (2015) Prepregnancy body mass and weight gain during pregnancy in India and sub-Saharan Africa. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA 112(11), 3302–3307.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Danaei, G, Andrews, KG, Sudfeld, CR, Fink, G, McCoy, DC, Peet, E et al. (2016) Risk factors for childhood stunting in 137 developing countries: a comparative risk assessment analysis at global, regional, and country levels. PLoS Medicine 13(11), e1002164.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Deaton, A (2008) Height, health, and inequality: the distribution of adult heights in India. American Economic Review 98(2), 468–474.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
de Onis, M and Branca, F (2016) Childhood stunting: a global perspective. Maternal and Child Nutrition 12 (Supplement 1), 12–26.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dubois, L, Kyvik, KO, Girard, M, Tatone-Tokuda, F, Pérusse, D, Hjelmborg, J et al. (2012) Genetic and environmental contributions to weight, height, and BMI from birth to 19 years of age: an international study of over 12,000 twin pairs. PLoS One 7(2), e3015.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Duggleby, SL and Jackson, AA (2001) Relationship of maternal protein turnover and lean body mass during pregnancy and birth length. Clinical Science 101(1), 65–72.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Fleming, TP, Watkins, AJ, Velazquez, MA, Mathers, JC, Prentice, AM, Stephenson, J et al. (2018) Origins of lifetime health around the time of conception: causes and consequences. The Lancet 391(10132), 1842–1852.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Garza, C, Borghi, E, Onyango, AW and de Onis, M (2013) Parental height and child growth from birth to 2 years in the WHO Multicentre Growth Reference Study. Maternal and Child Nutrition 9 (Supplement 2), 58–68.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Grantham-McGregor, S, Cheung, YB, Cueto, S, Glewwe, P, Richter, L, Strupp, B et al. (2007) Developmental potential in the first 5 years for children in developing countries. Lancet 369(9555), 60–70.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
IIPS and ICF (2017) National Family Health Survey (NFHS-4), 2015–16. International Institute for Population Sciences, Mumbai.Google Scholar
Martorell, R, Khan, LK, Schroeder, DG (1994) Reversibility of stunting: epidemiological findings in children from developing countries. European Journal of Clinical Nutrition 48 (Supplement 1), S45–S57.Google Scholar
Martorell, R and Zongrone, A (2012) Intergenerational influences on child growth and undernutrition. Paediatric and Perinatal Epidemiology 26 (Supplement 1), 302–314.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Menon, P, Headey, D, Avula, R and Nguyen, PH (2018) Understanding the geographical burden of stunting in India: a regression-decomposition analysis of district-level data from 2015–16. Maternal and Child Nutrition 14(4), e12620.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ozaltin, E, Hill, K, and Subramanian, SV (2010) Association of maternal stature with offspring mortality, underweight, and stunting in low- to middle-income countries. Journal of the American Medical Association 303(15), 1507–1516.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Pandey, A and Singh, KK (2015) Contraceptive use before first pregnancy by women in India (2005–2006): determinants and differentials. BMC Public Health 15(1), 1316.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rehman, AM, Gladstone, BP, Verghese, VP, Muliyil, J, Jaffar, S and Kang, G (2009) Chronic growth faltering amongst a birth cohort of Indian children begins prior to weaning and is highly prevalent at three years of age. Nutrition Journal 8(1), 44.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Stephenson, J, Heslehurst, N, Hall, J, Schoenaker, DAJM, Hutchinson, J, Cade, JE et al. (2018) Before the beginning: nutrition and lifestyle in the preconception period and its importance for future health. The Lancet 391(10132), 1830–1841.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Subramanian, SV, Ackerson, LK and Smith, GD (2010) Parental BMI and childhood undernutrition in India: an assessment of intrauterine influence. Pediatrics 126(3), e663–671.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Subramanian, SV, Ackerson, LK, Smith, GD and John, NA (2009) Association of maternal height with child mortality, anthropometric failure, and anemia in India. Journal of the American Medical Association 301(16), 1691–1701.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Victora, CG, de Onis, M, Hallal, PC, Blossner, M and Shrimpton, R (2010) Worldwide timing of growth faltering: revisiting implications for interventions. Pediatrics 125(3), 473–480.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
WHO (2008) Training Course on Child Growth Assessment. World Health Organization, Geneva.Google Scholar
Yip, R, Scanlon, K and Trowbridge, F (1992) Improving growth status of Asian refugee children in the United States. Journal of the American Medical Association 267(7), 937–940.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed