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Response to Chris Booker

International Journal of Obesity volume 34, page 212 (2010)Cite this article

Mr Booker's thoughtful comments on the accelerator hypothesis are appreciated.1 A hypothesis will indeed stand only when there is evidence to support it, and generalizability is crucial.

The accelerator hypothesis took an observation and sought a mechanism to explain it. The observation was the parallel rise in childhood obesity and type 1 diabetes over the past 25 years, and the mechanism proposed that of increasing insulin resistance.2 Many other mechanisms have been suggested to explain the rise in type 1 diabetes in children, but body mass index (BMI) is the only one to have shown an (inverse) correlation with age at diabetes onset—true acceleration. This is important because correlation extends beyond co-incidence in populations to association among individuals.

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References

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  1. University Medicine, Derriford Hospital, Plymouth, Devon, UK

    T Wilkin

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Correspondence to T Wilkin.

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Wilkin, T. Response to Chris Booker. Int J Obes 34, 212 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/ijo.2009.218

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