Excessive internet use, or internet addiction (IA), is linked with an elevated risk of depression, according to a report in the journal Psychopathology.

Investigators pooled survey data on 1,319 people, between the ages of 16 and 51 years. According to the report, “three scales were included: the IA Test, the Internet Function Questionnaire and the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI).” A total of 18 (1.2%) of participants met criteria for IA.

“Across the whole data sample, there was a close relationship between IA tendencies and depression, such that IA respondents were more depressed; there were also significant differences between the sexes, with men showing more addictive tendencies than women. In addition, young people were significantly more likely to show addictive symptoms than were older people.”

“The concept of IA is emerging as a construct that must be taken seriously,” conclude the study’s authors.

Psychopathology – February 2010;43:121-126.
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A new study of 8,550 children suggests that regularly engaging in one or more of three household routines significantly cut a pre-schooler’s risk of obesity. These routines are: 1) eating dinner as a family more than five times a week, 2) sleeping least 10.5 hours a night and 3) limiting weekday television viewing time to less than 2 hours per day.

Specifically, 4-year-olds living in homes with all three routines had an almost 40% lower prevalence of obesity than did children living in homes that practiced none of these routines.

“The routines were protective even among groups that typically have a high risk for obesity. This is important because it suggests that there’s a potential for these routines to be useful targets for obesity prevention in all children,” notes lead study author, Sarah Anderson.

Among 4-year-old children whose households practiced all three routines, the prevalence of obesity was 14.3%. In contrast, 24.5% of children living in households without any of the routines were obese.

“We chose these routines to study because in addition to their potential to protect against obesity, other research has shown that they promote children’s social, emotional and cognitive development. That’s important when we think about the implications of our study,” adds Anderson .

Pediatrics – March 2010;125(3).
www.pediatrics.org

Drinking as little as two sugar-sweetened soft drinks per week may nearly double the risk of developing pancreatic cancer, say scientists.

Mark Pereira, Ph.D., senior author on the study, explains that “the high levels of sugar in soft drinks may be increasing the level of insulin in the body, which we think contributes to pancreatic cancer cell growth.”

As part of the study, the researchers tracked 60,524 men and women in the Singapore Chinese Health Study for 14 years. During that time, there were 140 pancreatic cancer cases. Those who consumed two or more primarily carbonated sugar-sweetened soft drinks per week (averaging five per week) had an 87% bolstered risk, compared with people who refrained from soft drinks.

In contrast, no link was found between fruit juice consumption and pancreatic cancer.

Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention – February 2010;19:447-455.
cebp.aacrjournals.org

Slow breathing may lessen pain, according to a report in the journal Pain, which compared 27 women with fibromyalgia with 25 healthy women.

According to the article, participants “were exposed to low and moderate thermal pain pulses during paced breathing at their normal rate and one-half their normal rate. Thermal pain pulses were presented in four blocks of four trials. Each block included exposure to both mild and moderate pain trials, and periods of both normal and slow paced breathing.”

Slow breathing lessened pain and emotional discomfort in both groups of women, “particularly for moderately versus mildly painful thermal stimuli.” However, the findings were greater and more reliable among healthy women versus those with fibromyalgia.

Pain – January 15, 2010;Epub.
www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/03043959

A new investigation sheds light on how heavy backpacks impact children’s spines. According to the study’s authors “this is the first upright MRI study to document reduced disc height and greater lumbar asymmetry for common backpack loads in children.”

Dr. Timothy Neuschwander of University of California , San Diego , used magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), to study the spines of eight children, with a mean age of 11 years. They scanned the youngsters first with an empty backpack, then with increasing weights of 9, 18, and 26 lb. These weights represented about 10%, 20%, and 30% of the children’s body weight.

Heavier weights caused intervertebral discs depression and decreased disc height. Heavier loads were also associated with increased curvature of the lumbar spine, either to the right or the left. Half of the children had a significant spinal curve even with the 18 lb weight, with Cobb angles greater than 10°. Most of the children had to adjust their posture to bear the 26 lb backpack load.

As backpack weight increased, so did the amount of pain reported by the children.

Although the children were wearing the backpack straps over both shoulders when the MRI scans were performed, the researchers note that spinal curvature could be even greater if the backpack was carried over one shoulder.

“Low back pain in children may be worsened by discogenic or postural changes,” Dr. Neuschwander and colleagues write. This could have long-term implications, as children with back pain are at increased risk of having back pain as adults.

Spine – January 1, 2010 ;35:83-88.
www.spinejournal.com