Weighing Down My Career: Exploring Body Fat’s Impact on Career Success and Sex’s Moderating Role

Abstract

The CDC recognizes that much of the worldwide population is obese or overweight. However, the effects of body fat on a person’s workplace success, especially in the long term, are not well known. Further, we have relatively little insights into the dominant mechanisms by which obesity influences objective career outcomes. Aiming to understand if, how, and when employee body fat impacts career success over time, we challenge prior theory (i.e., stigma theory) and employ a novel medical perspective to suggest that an employee’s health - in the form of illnesses like cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and joint issues - determines the relationship between employee obesity levels and long-term work success. Furthermore, we integrate research from evolutionary biology to further consider the moderating role of employee sex in the health process. Longitudinal results from a nationally representative, multi-wave sample (across 20 years) show that employee health -but not stigmatization or other explanations- mediates the negative relationship between employee body fat levels and objective career success. Moreover, findings revealed that employee sex did not moderate this indirect effect, indicating that the high body fat men and women equally experience adverse career effects due to the serious medical impairments they incur. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.