Does breakfast consumption necessarily reduce body weight? Korean experience

Abstract

This paper examines the empirical relationship between breakfast consumption and body mass index (BMI) for the labor force in Korea. The sample size of 3881 participants in a national survey was divided into two groups based on BMI levels: underweight (BMI < 25) and overweight (BMI ≥ 25). Regression models were estimated to test for the hypothesis that breakfast consumption reduces body weight for overweight people but enables weight gain for underweight people, and hence breakfast intake helps maintain a healthy body weight in either case. Several demographic factors were also included in the model to examine their various impacts on BMI. We further investigated any potential statistical problems that often occur in the cross-sectional data: one is the multicollinearity problem, and another is the heteroscedasticity problem. For the robustness of the results, our sample was further divided into three different age groups, and the key findings were reaffirmed with interaction effects. One significant discovery is that breakfast consumption helped decrease body weight for those categorized as overweight, while it tended to increase body weight for those classified as underweight. In either case, eating breakfast is highly advised and recommended to establish a more balanced and healthier body weight.