Appetite 171 (2022) 105915 Available online 7 January 2022 0195-6663/© 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Don’t take the context out of the picture: Contextually shaped parents’ and children’s obesogenic behaviors in a marginalized area of Mexico City Olivia De-Jongh Gonz´ alez, PhD a, c, * , Ang´ elica Ojeda García, PhD a , Bernardo Turnbull, PhD a , Christian E. Cruz Torres, PhD b , M. Ang´ elica Le´ on Elizalde, MSc c , Ericka I. Escalante Izeta, PhD d a Psychology Department, Universidad Iberoamericana of Mexico City, 880 Prolongaci´ on Paseo de la Reforma, Lomas de Santa Fe, ´ Alvaro Obreg´ on, Mexico City, CP 01219, Mexico b Psychology Department, Universidad de Guanajuato Campus Le´ on, Blvd. Puente Milenio No. 1001 Fracci´ on del Predio San Carlos, CP 37670, Guanajuato, M´ exico c School of Population and Public Health, University of British Columbia, BC Children’s Hospital Research Institute, F514-4490 Oak Street, Vancouver, British Columbia, V6H 3V4, Canada d Health Department, Universidad Iberoamericana of Puebla. 2901 Blvd. del Ni˜ no Poblano, Reserva Territorial Atlixc´ ayotl, San Andr´ es Cholula, Puebla, CP 72820, Mexico A R T I C L E INFO Keywords: Childhood obesity Emotional eating Parenting practices Guilt-motivated parenting Family context Social context ABSTRACT Santa Fe Gully zone is a marginalized area of Mexico City where nearly 39% of children live with either over- weight or obesity. Despite the extensive research on obesogenic behaviors, studies frequently overlook the contexts where such behaviors occur. This qualitative study described individual and familial obesogenic be- haviors among children with obesity from Santa Fe Gully, and explained how these behaviors might be con- textually shaped. We used a grounded theory approach to investigate the process of development/maintenance of obesity in our sample. Fifteen participants (seven 10-year-olds with overweight or obesity and their parents) participated in nine art-based focus groups, and parents completed individual semi-structured interviews. Data were analyzed using a structured thematic content analysis. Results showed children’s weight status was part of their identity, providing children with a familial ‘ftting’ sense while increasing psychosocial diffculties, leading to emotional overeating as a coping strategy. Parents’ use of controlling and low-structured parenting practices reinforced children’s emotional overeating and failed to regulate children’s dietary and physical activity be- haviors. Some low-structured parenting practices were guilt-motivated or fostered by socioeconomic and cultural factors (e.g., limited food access, unhealthy food exposure, community unsafety). Future interventions in Santa Fe Gully aimed at modifying obesogenic behaviors should incorporate systemic and ecological approaches to help participants navigate through contextual obstacles, as their behaviors should be analized considering the context where they occur. 1. Introduction In Mexico, nearly 30% of children live with either overweight or obesity (Barquera, Campos, & Rivera, 2013). Moreover, in some marginalized areas of Mexico City such as Santa Fe Gully, this preva- lence rises to 39% (Schiffman, 2015), which is concerning due to its medical and psychosocial consequences (Rankin et al., 2016; Reilly & Kelly, 2011). From an etiological perspective, childhood obesity is a complex health condition that requires an ecological system-level approach, as it derives from a wide array of interacting bio-psycho-social factors (Birch & Ventura, 2009; Davison & Birch, 2001). Understanding these factors is necessary to develop effective interventions aimed at promoting children’s overall health and wellbeing. One of the most accepted explanatory approaches of pediatric obesity is the ecological model (Davison & Birch, 2001), which describes a set of multi-context factors that interact with each other. This model identifes factors that infuence children’s weight at different levels, starting with those that have the most direct level of infuence (i.e., individual factors), following with second-level factors (i.e., the familial * Corresponding author. Postdoctoral Research Fellow at School of Population and Public Health, University of British Columbia & BC Children’s Hospital Research Institute, F514-4480 Oak Street, Vancouver, BC, V6H 3V4, Canada. E-mail addresses: olivia.djgonzalez@bcchr.ca (O. De-Jongh Gonz´ alez), angelica.ojeda@ibero.mx (A. Ojeda García), bernardo.turnbull@ibero.mx (B. Turnbull), cassiel.79@gmail.com (C.E. Cruz Torres), aleon@bcchr.ca (M.A. Le´ on Elizalde), erickaileana.escalante@iberopuebla.mx (E.I. Escalante Izeta). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Appetite journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/appet https://doi.org/10.1016/j.appet.2022.105915 Received 2 August 2021; Received in revised form 21 December 2021; Accepted 5 January 2022