Bottle-fed babies are more likely to become obese children, a new study has claimed.
It suggests that babies who are fed formula rather than breast milk and move onto solids early on consume more calories, thus experiencing weight gain as a young child.
The researchers also believe that babies who are breast-fed are better at regulating their own milk intake, stopping when they have had enough but parents feeding babies from a bottle often make sure they finish it all and do not always reduce the quantity when the child moves onto solids.
Scientists at the University of Bristol claim that this increased milk intake, combined with weaning babies onto solids too early, means they are at risk of obesity as they grow older.
The study examined the detailed feeding history of 900 mothers and their babies over a 14 year period.
It found that babies with a high calorie intake were 50 per cent more likely to be obese at the age of three, with a 25 per cent risk at the age of five.
Dr Pauline Emmett, the senior nutritionist in the study, said: "It could be that more advice should be made available about weaning, tailored to the particular needs of formula-fed infants.
"In the push to persuade mothers to breast feed, which of course is the first objective, perhaps we have neglected to provide adequate information to formula feeders."
By four months old, around three-quarters of babies in the UK are fed by bottled formula rather than breast milk, even though the government recommends breast-feeding for the first six months.