Overweight and School: Are There Any Perceived Achievement Consequences of Overweight Among American Youth?

Abstract

In an effort to address the issue of overweight among youth, there is a growing body of research concerning the procurement food, the consequences of ingesting it and knowledge of the cultural cuisine rules (such as American cuisine may include hot dogs, hamburgers, fries and apple pie). However, there are few studies that examine the relationships between overweight and academic performance among adolescents. Based on the data collected by the World Health Organization in 1998, this study analyzed the relationships between overweight and student perceived academic performance for 15,686 children who were 10 to 15 years old. The results indicated that reported overweight was not statistically significantly related to perceived academic performance for these adolescents, while controlling for parental education level, gender, age, ethnicity, body image and other school-related variables. However, adolescents who were overweight were more likely to report that students were less friendly than those who were not overweight.