Family income gradients in adolescent obesity, overweight and adiposity persist in extremely deprived and extremely affluent neighbourhoods but not in middle-class Neighbourhoods: evidence from the UK millennium cohort study
Author(s)
Mireku, Michael Osei
Rodriguez, Alina
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
We investigated whether family income gradients in obesity, overweight, and adiposity persist at geographic-level deprivation quintiles using a nationally representative cohort of UK adolescents. Data from 11,714 eligible adolescents from the sixth sweep of the Millennium Cohort Study (14 years old) were analysed in this study. The International Obesity Task Force age- and sex-specific thresholds were used to define obesity and overweight. Self-reported family income was standardized using the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)’s equivalised income scale. Geographic-level deprivation was defined by the index of multiple deprivation 2004. Results showed that the prevalence of obesity and overweight was 8.0% and 27.2%, respectively. Mean percentage body fat was 16.9% (standard error, SE = 0.2%) in male and 27.3% (SE = 0.1%) in female adolescents. Risk of obesity, overweight, and adiposity increased with decreasing family income quintiles (p for trend <0.001). After stratifying by geographic-level deprivation quintiles, a U-shaped association emerged, whereby family income gradients in the risk of adolescent obesity and adiposity persisted in extremely affluent and extremely deprived neighbourhoods but attenuated to non-significance in middle-class neighbourhoods. These results focus on the findings from England. Recognition of the persistence of inequalities in the risk of obesity in the most deprived and affluent neighbourhoods may be necessary in planning public health resources and interventions.
Date Issued
2020-01-08
Date Acceptance
2020-01-04
Citation
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2020, 17 (2), pp.1-12
ISSN
1660-4601
Publisher
MDPI AG
Start Page
1
End Page
12
Journal / Book Title
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
Volume
17
Issue
2
Copyright Statement
© 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access
article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution
(CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution
(CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
License URL
Identifier
http://gateway.webofknowledge.com/gateway/Gateway.cgi?GWVersion=2&SrcApp=PARTNER_APP&SrcAuth=LinksAMR&KeyUT=WOS:000516827400039&DestLinkType=FullRecord&DestApp=ALL_WOS&UsrCustomerID=1ba7043ffcc86c417c072aa74d649202
Subjects
Science & Technology
Life Sciences & Biomedicine
Environmental Sciences
Public, Environmental & Occupational Health
Environmental Sciences & Ecology
socioeconomic
deprivation
geographic variation
adolescence
obesity
adiposity
BMI
inequality
family income
CHILDHOOD OBESITY
SOCIOECONOMIC INEQUALITIES
HEALTH
ASSOCIATION
DEPRIVATION
COUNTRIES
CHILDREN
RISK
PREVALENCE
PREDICTORS
Publication Status
Published
Article Number
ARTN 418
Date Publish Online
2020-01-08