US Researchers Say "Different Spoon Colors Affect Children's Height"

"Among Environmental Factors, Parental Wealth Has Major Influence"
Exposure to Nutritious Food and Social Capital
Donald Trump Jr. Reaches Height of 201 cm

President-elect of the United States Donald Trump and his wife with their youngest son Barron. Photo by Reuters and Yonhap News.

A study has found that children raised in affluent family environments are more likely to be taller than those who are not.

On the 22nd (local time), the British Daily Mail reported that a research team from Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York presented findings on the correlation between parental wealth and children's height at the American Heart Association conference held recently in Chicago, Illinois. According to the report, a study conducted on 13,000 Hispanic Americans revealed that a wealthy family environment has a greater impact on height than other factors. This is because children raised in affluent families tend to consume more nutritious food and are frequently exposed to social capital that promotes growth, such as physical activities.

Previous studies have explained that a child's height is determined by 70-80% genetics and 20-30% environmental factors. However, this study revealed that among the 20-30% environmental factors, parental wealth has a greater influence than previously understood. Furthermore, the taller stature of children raised in wealthy environments was found to be highly correlated with better heart health and cognitive abilities.

This research has attracted attention after it became known that children of celebrities tend to be unusually tall. For example, Jesse Grills, son of British survival expert Bear Grylls, is reported to be about 10 cm taller than his father, who is 182 cm tall. Additionally, Barron, the son of then U.S. President-elect Donald Trump and his third wife Melania, is 201 cm tall, which is taller than Trump’s 191 cm height.

Meanwhile, according to The Conversation, a nonprofit academic media outlet, experts from the World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF) analyzed that taller individuals have a higher risk of developing ovarian, kidney, and colon cancers compared to shorter individuals. They conducted a large-scale study involving 1,297,124 adult women in the UK and announced that for every 10 cm increase in height, the risk of ovarian cancer increases by 17%, kidney cancer by 29%, and colon cancer by 25%. Experts explained that taller people have more cell divisions, during which some genes may be damaged, and the accumulation of damaged genes can lead to cancer.