Session: Dimensions of Obesity: Norms, Perceptions and Environment
Room: Phillips 403
Time: Tue 13:15-14:45

Presenter: Mir Ali (University of Toledo. Economics)

Discussant: Mary Burke (Federal Reserve Bank of Boston)

Abstract

Excess body weight among children and adolescents over the last two decades have been documented widely and is considered one of the most pressing health problems today. This shift to the right of the body weight distribution may have affected individuals’ view of their own body weight status, especially if individuals use people around them as reference point to assess their own weight status. Social networks may play an important role not only on the dynamics of the body weight, but also on the perception of one’s own body weight status, since adolescents are more likely to assess their body weight status by looking at others in their network rather than using clinical recommendations. It is recognized that public health interventions targeted towards changing lifestyle behaviors to reduce overweight is a considerable challenge. It is important that individuals recognize their overweight status to be a health risk in order for an effective change in lifestyle behaviors to occur and growing evidence suggest that actual weight and perception of weight status often do not match especially among adolescents.

Placing oneself in a weight category that is incongruent with clinical classification is quite common. The literature has consistently found that self-assessment or even parents-assessment of their children’s weight status is often incorrect. Although it is unclear what factors may influence misperception of weight status, a growing literature suggests that weight norms, ideals, and perceptions are greatly influenced by the adolescent’s social networks. This literature suggests that individuals are more likely to underestimate their weight status when they are exposed to overweight and obese people in their immediate surroundings such as home, neighborhood and school. In particular, children and adolescents who are surrounded by many overweight peers and family members may inaccurately perceive their weight status, i.e. their own weight status might appear to them as normal by comparison. However, this area of research was either limited to cross tabulations or was unable to fully separate the influence of environmental factors from the direct influence of social networks on weight misperception.

In this paper, we explore the extent to which adolescents who are exposed to overweight peer and parents are more likely to misperceive their own weight status. We extend the analysis by estimating models of social interactions that account for environmental confounding factors and the bi-directionality of peer influence. In addition, we also utilize various measures of reference groups including close friends and more exogenous groups constructed at the school and neighborhood levels. Using data from a nationally representative sample of adolescents we estimate instrumental variable models with school level fixed effects to account for bi-directionality of peer influence and environmental confounders. Our results indicate that individuals who live in environment that exposes them to overweight/obese parent and heavier peers are more likely to misperceive their weight status and think of themselves to be of lower weight than they actually are. Our analysis also revealed differential effect by gender and type of peers.

Key Terms

Weight Misperception; Adolescents; Peer Influence

Authors:

Mir Ali (University of Toledo. Economics) , Aliaksandr Amialchuk (University of Toledo. Economics) and Francesco Renna (University of Akron. Economics)