Rachel Johnson, dean of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, is the co-author of a new study on children's flavored milk consumption, released in the April 1 issue of the Journal of the American Dietetic Association. The study found that children who drink flavored or plain milk consume more nutrients and have a lower or comparable body mass index (BMI — a measure of body fatness) than children who don't drink milk.

Although common sense might lead one to believe that the added sugar in chocolate or other flavored milk would make the drink detrimental to kids' diets and weight, Johnson and co-author Mary Murphy, science manager of the ENVIRON Health Sciences Institute, found otherwise.

The study compared nutrient intakes and BMIs among 7,557 U.S. children and adolescents ages 2-18 years drinking flavored milk (with or without plain milk), exclusively plain milk and no milk. All comparisons were adjusted for the amount of calories reported as well as age, allowing for differences to be examined based on equal consumption of calories and age distributions. Results showed milk drinkers (flavored and plain) had significantly higher intakes of vitamin A, calcium, phosphorus, magnesium and potassium than non-milk drinkers.

In addition, BMI measures of milk drinkers were comparable to or lower than measures of non-milk drinkers. Intake of added sugars did not differ between flavored milk drinkers and non-milk drinkers. Among females 12-18 years of age, average calcium intakes by flavored milk drinkers and exclusively plain milk drinkers were nearly double the calcium intakes of non-milk drinkers.

"Intakes of added sugars were comparable between flavored milk drinkers and non-milk drinkers," Johnson notes, "confirming that the inclusion of flavored milk in the diet does not lead to significantly higher added sugar intakes by children and adolescents."

The study is already garnering the attention of the national media. The research was covered on the April 1 edition of ABC World News Tonight and will appear in a forthcoming article on Newsweek.com.