Passage 6
Questions 26 to 30 are based on the following passage.
Getting a good night's sleep tonight could guard children against weight gain in the future. According to a new study, putting preschoolers in bed by 8 p.m. could reduce their chances of becoming overweight or obese(肥胖的) later in life by half. Preschoolers are children around the age of 4 or 5.
The term "obese"refers” to calculations of your Body Mass Index, what doctors call BMI. They use person's height, weight and age to assess their amount of body fat. BMIs help tell whether a person is underweight, normal, overweight or obese. The World Health Organization says obesity can lead to serious long-term health problems like diabetes (糖尿病)， heart disease and stroke.
Researchers from the Ohio State University's College of Public Health have found that young children who go to bed after 9 p.m. are twice as likely to be obese later in life. The lead author of the study is Sarah Anderson. She is an associate professor of epidemiology(流行病学). She studies how diseases spread and how they can be controlled. Anderson says that, for parents, the results of the study support the importance of creating a bedtime routine. She says that having a usual bedtime routine is something "families can do to lower their child's risk"of becoming overweight.
A usual, early bedtime, Anderson adds, "is also likely to have positive benefits on behavior and on social, emotional and cognitive development." Researchers used data from 977 children for the study. These children are part of a larger project called the Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development. The project follows healthy babies born in 1991 in 10 U.S. cities.
The children were 4.5 years old when their mothers reported their usual weekday bedtime. Researchers then divided the children into three groups: A) those who went to bed by 8 p.m. or earlier;B) those who went to bed between 8 p.m. and p.m. and C) those whose bedtimes were after 9 p.m.
When these children turned 15 years old, the researchers looked at their rates of obesity. Of those with the earliest bedtimes only one out of 10 was obese. Of those who went to bed between 8 and 9 p.m., 16 percent became obese. And out of those with the latest bedtimes, 23 percent became obese. Anderson said putting children in bed early does not mean they will immediately fall asleep. But,she adds, it makes it"more likely that children will get the amount of sleep they need to be at their best."
A preschooler is most likely to become obese later in life if he____