Weighty questions
Does Knowing Hurt? Perceiving Oneself as Overweight Predicts Future Physical Health and Well-Being
Michael Daly, Eric Robinson & Angelina Sutin
Psychological Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
Identifying oneself as being overweight may be associated with adverse health outcomes, yet prospective tests of this possibility are lacking. Over 7 years, we examined associations between perceptions of being overweight and subsequent health in a sample of 3,582 U.S. adults. Perceiving oneself as being overweight predicted longitudinal declines in subjective health (d = −0.22, p < .001), increases in depressive symptoms (d = 0.09, p < .05), and raised levels of physiological dysregulation (d = 0.24, p < .001), as gauged by clinical indicators of cardiovascular, inflammatory, and metabolic functioning. These associations remained after controlling for a range of potential confounders and were observed irrespective of whether perceptions of being overweight were accurate or inaccurate. This research highlights the possibility that identifying oneself as overweight may act independently of body mass index to contribute to unhealthy profiles of physiological functioning and impaired health over time. These findings underscore the importance of evaluating whether weight-feedback interventions may have unforeseen adverse consequences.
Body-Weight and Women's Hours of Work: More Evidence that Marriage Markets Matter
Shoshana Amyra Grossbard & Sankar Mukhopadhyay
San Diego State University Working Paper, May 2017
Abstract:
Higher body-weight (BMI) can affect labor supply via its effects on outcomes in both labor markets and marriage markets. To the extent that it is associated with lower prospects of being in couple and obtaining intra-couple transfers, we expect that higher BMI will increase willingness to supply labor in labor markets, especially for women. We use US panel data from the NLSY79 and NLSY97 to examine whether body weight influences hours of work in the labor market. We use sibling BMI as an instrument for own BMI to address potential endogeneity of BMI in hours worked. We find that White women with higher BMI work more. This is true for both single and married White women. Results for other groups of women and men produce mixed results. The extended analysis suggests that what drives the relationship between BMI and hours worked is not lower market wages earned by high-BMI women, but rather lower spousal transfers to married women or lower expected intra-marriage transfers to single women.
Getting Weighed Down: The Effect of Childhood Obesity on the Development of Socioemotional Skills
Nicole Black & Sonja Kassenboehmer
Journal of Human Capital, Summer 2017, Pages 263-295
Abstract:
Childhood obesity not only has serious long-term health implications but also can hinder the development of socioemotional skills. We use data from the Longitudinal Survey of Australian Children to examine the effect of childhood obesity on socioemotional difficulties. Using various specifications to estimate the socioemotional-skills production function, we show that obesity increases emotional problems for both genders and increases peer problems and decreases conduct problems for boys. Obesity does not appear to affect hyperactivity or prosocial behavior. Our results are robust to alternative identifying assumptions, the inclusion of a range of time-varying shocks, and alternative measures of adiposity. Our findings suggest that childhood obesity adversely affects emotional and social skills, which are both important determinants of human capital development and future economic prosperity.
Reading Between the Menu Lines: Are Restaurants’ Descriptions of “Healthy” Foods Unappealing?
Bradley Turnwald et al.
Health Psychology, forthcoming
Objective: As obesity rates continue to climb in America, much of the blame has fallen on the high-calorie meals at popular chain restaurants. Many restaurants have responded by offering “healthy” menu options. Yet menus’ descriptions of healthy options may be less attractive than their descriptions of less healthy, standard options. This study examined the hypothesis that the words describing items in healthy menu sections are less appealing than the words describing items in standard menu sections.
Method: Menus from the top-selling American casual-dining chain restaurants with dedicated healthy submenus (N = 26) were examined, and the library of words from health-labeled items (N = 5,873) was compared to that from standard menu items (N = 38,343) across 22 qualitative themes (e.g., taste, texture).
Results: Log-likelihood ratios revealed that restaurants described healthy items with significantly less appealing themes and significantly more health-related themes. Specifically, healthy items were described as less exciting, fun, traditional, American regional, textured, provocative, spicy hot, artisanal, tasty, and indulgent than standard menu items, but were described with significantly more foreign, fresh, simple, macronutrient, deprivation, thinness, and nutritious words.
“Smile away your cravings” – Facial feedback modulates cue-induced food cravings
Jennifer Schmidt & Alexandra Martin
Appetite, September 2017, Pages 536–543
Abstract:
Food cravings are common experiences that precede dysfunctional eating behaviors, such as overeating and binge eating. These cravings are often related to negative affect, especially in emotional eaters. Recent studies have revived interest in a theory on the implicit modulation of affect: the facial feedback-hypothesis. This theory claims that mimic expressions influence affective experiences. Given the association between negative affect and food craving, facial feedback could provide a means to reduce or prevent food cravings. In an experimental study, using a read aloud task, we examined, whether an implicit modulation of facial muscle activity − zygomatic muscle (smiling: FF+) and corrugator muscle (frowning: FF-) − would alter food cue-induced cravings in healthy young women (n = 60). We further examined, if traits in emotional eating influence the facial feedback-effect. The activation of the zygomatic muscle prevented the occurrence of food cravings after exposure with palatable food cues. Food craving only increased in the FF- group (p = 0.029). The facial feedback effect was especially pronounced in emotional eaters, indicated by a significant moderation (p = 0.041). In participants with high degrees of emotional eating, food craving was reduced in the FF + group and amplified in the FF- group.
‘My lips are sealed’: The impact of package resealability on the consumption of tempting foods
Caroline De Bondt, Anneleen Van Kerckhove & Maggie Geuens
Appetite, October 2017, Pages 143–151
Abstract:
Resealable packages are nowadays omnipresent on store shelves. While the main advantage of the resealability feature is its ability to reclose the package in order to extend the shelf life of the food product inside, the present research's aim is to assess whether this advantage also has implications for palatable, energy-dense food consumption. Two studies provide intentional as well as behavioral evidence for the claim that consumers are better able to self-regulate their consumption and thus eat less in one occasion when a palatable, energy-dense food product is offered in a resealable (vs. unresealable) package. A third study investigates the effect of package resealability across multiple consumption occasions and reveals that the resealability feature limits the volume consumed on each occasion (conditional on consumption incidence) while it does not accelerate consumption frequency, resulting in a lower total consumed volume of palatable, energy-dense snacks over a six-day period. This research offers actionable insights for consumer welfare and public health care and aids manufacturers in delineating optimal food packaging strategies.
The impact of marriage and parenthood on male body mass index: Static and dynamic effects
Joanna Syrda
Social Science & Medicine, August 2017, Pages 148–155
Method: Using the Panel Study of Income Dynamics 1999–2013 dataset (N = 8729), this study was the first to employ a dynamic panel-data estimation to examine the static and dynamic effects of marriage, divorce, and fatherhood on male BMI.
Results: The study showed that married men have higher BMI, but marital status changes largely drove this static effect, namely, an increase in BMI in the period following marriage, and a decrease in BMI preceding and following divorce.
Conclusions: Thus, this study found marked evidence in support of the marriage market and social obligation theories' predictions about male BMI, and supports neither marriage protection theory nor marriage selection theory. Wives’ pregnancies had no significant effect on BMI; instead, men tend to have higher BMI in the periods following childbirth. Finally, analyses showed marked contemporaneous correlations between husband and wife BMI over the course of marriage.
Analyzing the impact of public transit usage on obesity
Zhaowei She, Douglas King & Sheldon Jacobson
Preventive Medicine, June 2017, Pages 264–268
Abstract:
The objective of this paper is to estimate the impact of county-level public transit usage on obesity prevalence in the United States and assess the potential for public transit usage as an intervention for obesity. This study adopts an instrumental regression approach to implicitly control for potential selection bias due to possible differences in commuting preferences among obese and non-obese populations. United States health data from the 2009 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System and transportation data from the 2009 National Household Travel Survey are aggregated and matched at the county level. County-level public transit accessibility and vehicle ownership rates are chosen as instrumental variables to implicitly control for unobservable commuting preferences. The results of this instrumental regression analysis suggest that a one percent increase in county population usage of public transit is associated with a 0.221 percent decrease in county population obesity prevalence at the α = 0.01 statistical significance level, when commuting preferences, amount of non-travel physical activity, education level, health resource, and distribution of income are fixed. Hence, this study provides empirical support for the effectiveness of encouraging public transit usage as an intervention strategy for obesity.
The Dynamic Effects of Obesity on the Wages of Young Workers
Joshua Pinkston
Economics & Human Biology, November 2017, Pages 154–166
Abstract:
This paper considers effects of body mass on wages in the years following labor market entry. The preferred models allow current wages to be affected by both past and current body mass, as well as past wages, while also addressing the endogeneity of body mass. I find that a history of severe obesity has a large negative effect on the wages of white men. White women face a penalty for a history of being overweight, with some evidence of additional penalties that begin above the threshold for severe obesity. Furthermore, the effects of past wages on current wages imply that past body mass has additional, indirect effects on wages, especially for white women.
Prediction of whole-body fat percentage and visceral adipose tissue mass from five anthropometric variables
Michelle Swainson et al.
PLoS ONE, May 2017
Background: The conventional measurement of obesity utilises the body mass index (BMI) criterion. Although there are benefits to this method, there is concern that not all individuals at risk of obesity-associated medical conditions are being identified. Whole-body fat percentage (%FM), and specifically visceral adipose tissue (VAT) mass, are correlated with and potentially implicated in disease trajectories, but are not fully accounted for through BMI evaluation. The aims of this study were (a) to compare five anthropometric predictors of %FM and VAT mass, and (b) to explore new cut-points for the best of these predictors to improve the characterisation of obesity.
Methods: BMI, waist circumference (WC), waist-to-hip ratio (WHR), waist-to-height ratio (WHtR) and waist/height0.5 (WHT.5R) were measured and calculated for 81 adults (40 women, 41 men; mean (SD) age: 38.4 (17.5) years; 94% Caucasian). Total body dual energy X-ray absorptiometry with Corescan (GE Lunar iDXA, Encore version 15.0) was also performed to quantify %FM and VAT mass. Linear regression analysis, stratified by sex, was applied to predict both %FM and VAT mass for each anthropometric variable. Within each sex, we used information theoretic methods (Akaike Information Criterion; AIC) to compare models. For the best anthropometric predictor, we derived tentative cut-points for classifying individuals as obese (>25% FM for men or >35% FM for women, or > highest tertile for VAT mass).
Results: The best predictor of both %FM and VAT mass in men and women was WHtR. Derived cut-points for predicting whole body obesity were 0.53 in men and 0.54 in women. The cut-point for predicting visceral obesity was 0.59 in both sexes.