AIM of the study was to examine the association between family socio-economic status, local area problems and prevalence of underweight, overweight and obesity in Polish 15-year-olds.
Material and methods: data from HBSC (Health Behaviour in School-aged Children) surveys, carried out in Poland in 2006 in representative sample of adolescents mean aged 15.7 (N = 2287) was used. An international standard questionnaire has been chosen as an instrument for data collection. Three indicators of socio-economic status (SES) were developed by researchers in HBSC study: FAS (Family Affluence Scale), PFW (Perceived Family Wealth) and LAP (Local Area Problems). Prevalence of underweight, overweight and obesity was estimated on the base of BMI national standards and WHO criteria. Comparative analyses were done by chi2 test and multivariate logistic regression models were used.
Results: the prevalence of overweight and obesity was higher in boys (12.9%) than in girls (8.7%, p < 0.001) and almost in the same frequency in urban and rural areas. Underweight was indicated in 4.4% 15-year-olds, more frequently in girls and in urban adolescents. Most of boys with overweight and obesity were from poor families by using FAS, especially in rural area (15%), and girls from poor families by using PFW (15.5%, p = 0.05). Gender and LAP were the strongest predictors of overweight and obesity. Underweight occurred more frequently in adolescents from rich families than from poor ones (for girls p = 0.023), in urban inhabitants and in the areas, where more local problems were observed.
Conclusions: Site of domicile is the differentiation's factor for underweight only, masculine gender is the independent predictor for overweight and obesity and status of local area is the only factor which has an effect on both underweight and overweight and obesity occurrence