Family social characteristics related to physical growth of young children

Altogether 164 poor families who had children of normal and subnormal weight and height were studied in Bogota, Colombia. Physical growth was found to be positively associated with expenditure on food, sanitary conditions in the home, mother's age, birth interval between surviving children, level of parental newspaper reading, aspirations for children, and socioeconomic status. Physical growth was negatively associated with crowded living conditions and family size. Only mother's age, family size, spacing of births, and sanitary conditions were related to weight and height, independent of socioeconomic status. Food expenditure, crowding, parental newspaper reading, and aspirations for children all reflected the influence of socioeconomic status upon physical growth. The findings emphasized the importance of within-class social differences as they affect the physical growth of young children.