Original article
The Association Between Body Mass Index in Adolescence and Obesity in Adulthood

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jadohealth.2007.10.010Get rights and content

Abstract

Purpose

This study used data from the National Longitudinal Study of Youth 1979 to examine the association between body mass index (BMI) in adolescence and obesity in adulthood.

Methods

Measurements of height and weight from 1981 and 2002 were used to calculate BMI for a cohort of 1309 adolescents at baseline and during adulthood. Associations between BMI at age 16/17 and obesity (BMI ≥30) at age 37/38 were analyzed using logistic regression analysis.

Results

When the predicted probability of adult obesity equaled 0.5, the point on the adolescent BMI distribution was close to the 85th percentile for both sexes (83rd percentile for females and 86th percentile for males). Among adolescents with a BMI in the 85th–<95th percentile, 62% of the males and 73% of the females became obese adults. Among those with a BMI ≥95th percentile, 80% of the males and 92% of the females became obese adults. Versus those with a BMI <85th percentile, those with a BMI in the 85th–<95th percentile were more likely to be obese (odds ratio = 7 for males, 11 for females) as adults, and those with a BMI ≥95th percentile were most likely to be obese (odds ratio = 18 for males, 49 for females) as adults.

Conclusion

Adolescents with a BMI ≥85th percentile are at elevated risk for obesity in adulthood. To prevent the development of obesity and its associated health risks, population-based efforts combined with targeted interventions for these high-risk adolescents are needed.

Section snippets

Methods

The NLSY79 is a nationally representative sample of 12,686 young men and women who were aged 14–22 years when initially interviewed in 1979. They were interviewed annually through 1994 and biennially from 1996 to the present. Sponsored by the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor, the primary purpose of the NLSY79 is to collect data on the experiences of the labor force. However, the actual content of the survey covers a broad range of topics, including educational

Results

The size and characteristics of the study sample and the excluded sample are summarized in Table 1. Of the 1309 study cohort, 39% were aged 16 and 61% aged 17 years at baseline. The sample was 20% Hispanic, 28% black, and 52% white/other (classified as nonblack/non-Hispanic in the NLSY79 data). Fifty-two percent (n = 684) were males, 47% had a college degree or above by 2002, and 50% had a family income above $20,000 in 1981. At age 16/17 years, 11% of the cohort had a BMI ≥85th percentile and

Discussion

The present study fills a void in the current literature by using recent data (from 2002) to determine risk for adult obesity among males and females who were aged 16–17 years in 1981. As we expected, youth who were classified as high risk (in this case, at the 85th percentile or higher in terms of BMI) were at significantly greater risk for obesity as adults than were their counterparts who were not considered high risk. When we examined youth whose BMI was at the 95th percentile or higher, we

Acknowledgments

The findings and conclusions in this report are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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