Six-year-olds suffering from body image issues

Children as young as six are suffering from body image problems and may be following dangerous diets, a new UK study has found.
The study of 300 British six and seven-year-olds found that heavier kids reported dissatisfaction with their bodies and started unhealthy diets to compensate.
Researchers found that youngsters expressed a desire for underweight bodies and said they were trying to eat less to stop being fat.
Many children are thus resorting to extreme diets, researchers said.
Meaghan Christian, of Leeds Beckett University, said this "may lead to compromising the quality of the diet at a time when they need a good quality, healthy diet for growth and development."

The findings came as researchers said that British children may not be much fatter than those in the rest of Europe, 'The Times' reported.

Data published by US academics found that 23 per cent of British toddlers were overweight, second only to Irish children on 27 per cent. However, different countries measure and define obesity in different ways, they said.
Rebecca Jones, of Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, said it was clear that childhood obesity was a concern across Europe.
"The big thing is to realise that even at such a young age, under five, there is a problem. We've had a mindset of a fat baby is a healthy baby which needs to be shifted in terms of how we talk to mothers," she said.