Volume 41 - Article 23 | Pages 649–678
When richer doesn’t mean thinner: Ethnicity, socioeconomic position, and the risk of child obesity in the United Kingdom
Date received: | 22 Jun 2018 |
Date published: | 05 Sep 2019 |
Word count: | 5605 |
Keywords: | children, disparities, ethnic minorities, obesity, socioeconomic differentials, United Kingdom |
DOI: | 10.4054/DemRes.2019.41.23 |
Additional files: | readme.41-23 (text file, 494 Byte) |
demographic-research.41-23 (zip file, 6 kB) | |
Abstract
Background: A range of studies report a robust association between family socioeconomic position and the prevalence of child overweight/obesity. On average, children from poorer backgrounds are more likely to be overweight/obese than children from more advantaged families. However, a small number of US studies have shown that, for ethnic minority children, the association is either nonexistent or reversed.
Objective: We test if the link between socioeconomic position and child overweight/obesity at age 7 is heterogeneous in the United Kingdom where rates of obesity are particularly high for some groups of ethnic minority children.
Methods: We use nationally representative data from the UK Millennium Cohort Study as well as descriptive analyses and logistic regression models.
Results: Poorer White children are at higher risk of overweight/obesity than higher income White children. However, socioeconomic disparities are reversed for Black African/Caribbean children and nonexistent for children of Indian and Pakistani/Bangladeshi origin. Moreover, the health behaviours that explain socioeconomic disparities in child overweight/obesity for the White group appear to be irrelevant in explaining differences by socioeconomic position for the Black Caribbean and African groups.
Conclusions: We should be careful in assuming that higher socioeconomic position is protective against child overweight/obesity for all groups of the population.
Contribution: This study shows for the first time important variation by ethnicity in the link between socioeconomic position and child overweight/obesity – and in the underlying mechanisms linking them – in the United Kingdom.
Author's Affiliation
Alice Goisis - University College London (UCL), United Kingdom
Melissa Martinson - University of Washington, United States of America
Wendy Sigle - London School of Economics and Political Science, United Kingdom
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