Aggression, withdrawal and attention problems for young soft drink consumers

Soft drink consumption is claimed to be associated with aggression, depression and suicidal thoughts in adolescents - now researchers are looking at its effects on younger children.

A study, scheduled for publication in The Journal of Pediatrics, is claiming that soft drink consumption by young children is resulting in aggression, attention problems and withdrawal behaviour.

Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, University of Vermont and Harvard School of Public Health assessed approximately 3000 5-year-old children enrolled in the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study, a prospective birth cohort that follows mother-child pairs from 20 large US cities. Mothers reported their child’s soft drink consumption and completed the Child Behavior Checklist based on their child’s behaviour during the previous two months. The researchers found that 43% of the children consumed at least one serving of soft drinks per day and 4% consumed four or more.

Assistant Professor of Epidemiology Shakira Suglia and her colleagues found that even after adjusting for sociodemographic factors, maternal depression, intimate partner violence and paternal incarceration, any soft drink consumption was associated with increased aggressive behaviour. Withdrawal and attention problems were also associated with soft drink consumption. Children who drank four or more soft drinks per day were more than twice as likely to destroy things belonging to others, get into fights and physically attack people. They also had increased attention problems and withdrawal behaviour compared with those who did not consume soft drinks.

According to Dr Suglia, “We found that the child’s aggressive behaviour score increased with every increase in soft drinks servings per day.”  Although this study cannot identify the exact nature of the association between soft drink consumption and problem behaviours, limiting or eliminating a child’s soft drink consumption may reduce behavioural problems.