As obesity increasingly becomes a global health concern, researchers try to figure out what we can do to maintain a healthy body and respectively a healthy body mass index. The latest study on this issue focuses on overweight and obese girls and you will never guess what else…Not to raise suspense anymore, it’s all about books…but not any kind of books, as reading is an activity which doesn’t involved too much physical activity. It’s all about books having an overweight heroine struggling to face the reality of having too many pounds.

“Lake Rescue” is the kind of book we’re referring at. Part of a series called Beacon Street Girls by Annie Bryant, the book is about a group of kids who go rock climbing, hiking and canoeing on a class trip to the mountains. One character in the book is an overweight girl, who is ridiculed by her classmates, but on this adventure, she learns to make healthy food choices and that physical activity is fun.

It appears that such book had deep impact on 31 obese girls, ages 9 to 13, chosen for the study by Duke University researchers, as they experienced a significant decrease in their body mass index by 0.71 percent compared to an increase of 0.05 percent in their peers who did not read the book. This category involved 17 girls.

Another group of 33 girls read a different book called “Charlotte in Paris,” which did not have an overweight heroine. The book told the story of a girl looking for a missing cat in Paris. These girls knew only 0.33 percent decrease in their body mass index.

“The book helped. It either helped them stay at the same weight while they were growing or even helped them lose their weight,” Alexandra C. Russell, MD, a fourth-year medical student at Duke University School of Medicine and the lead author of the study said.

It appears that a character they could relate to, an obese girl in our case is a more effective way to make obese or overweight girls realize there is a chance to lose weight as long as they know what is best for their health. “That may be a better way to reach kids rather than sitting them down and telling they must do this or that,” Russell said.

The study couldn’t come better, as childhood obesity is becoming an epidemic in the US. “Therefore we need to find ways to appeal to a large population in an effective way,” Russell added.

According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,  16 percent of children ages 6 to 9 are overweight or obese, a number that has tripled since 1980.

The findings of the study were presented Oct. 4 at the Obesity Society’s annual meeting in Phoenix.