Women might like their men muscle-bound and svelte, but babies prefer fatter fathers, a new study has found. Researchers from the University of Sheffield concluded that infants favoured chubby men because their bodies were more feminine and familiar. Psychologists showed photographs of toned male models next to images of overweight men to three groups of […]

With a quarter of Aussie kids now overweight or obese and thousands of others battling eating disorders, mum-of-two Zoe Arnold asks if it’s possible to raise kids with no body image hang-ups. Fat kids are becoming normal, just like fat adults. Visit any suburban mall and overweight families appear to outnumber average-sized people. But what […]

Australian children are now so fat doctors are removing their tonsils so they can breathe. A shocking report in today’s Daily Telegraph revealed the toll the obesity epidemic is having on our children’s health. Westmead Children’s Hospital’s paediatric obesity specialist Dr Shirley Alexander said he had treated kids as young as 18 months, while some […]

He’s back for The Voice, but last time pop sensation Ricky Martin was in Australia, he had a career and personal crisis that changed everything. Showing off his twin boys, the Latin heart-throb and single dad tells Caroline Overington how fatherhood has changed him — and how he wants to save the world, one child […]

A Victoria’s Secret lingerie campaign targeted at 15-year-old girls has outraged parents who claim it “portrays teens as sexual objects”. The new range Bright Young Things is part of the label’s Pink line, and is targeted at young teens under the age of 18. Related: Why girls are having sex at 12 “When somebody’s 15 […]

If I had a dollar for every time someone asked me “Aren’t you going to try for a boy?”, well … I may not be a rich woman, but I’d have had a fair few free lunches by now. I’m the mother of two girls, and no, I am not going to ever try for […]

Blurring the boundaries between men and women has brought Andrej Pejic international celebrity as a model, writes Caroline Overington, who talks to the 21-year-old and his mother about his career and family life. ASK any mother what they want for their children, they’ll probably say they want them to be happy. Drill down a little, […]

After nine years of hoping and dreaming for a child, and five years of IVF, TV journalist Leila McKinnon and her husband, Nine Network supremo David Gyngell, now have a beautiful red-haired baby boy to call their own, writes Michael Sheather. Leila McKinnon hadn’t considered the possibility of children before she met David, but by […]

I’m not sure how most fathers react when they are told that their newborn baby has Down syndrome, but if I am anything to go by it involves crying for a week. Six hours after the birth of our youngest daughter Emma we were told that she most likely had Down syndrome. The news wasn’t […]

Parents facing marriage breakdowns have cottoned on to a strategy practised by siblings of younger children all over the world — blame it on the baby. A survey of 2,000 parents found that a third of those who had divorced or separated blamed sleepless or interrupted nights caused by crying children. Parents of young children […]