Abstract
Purpose:The present study examines the extent to which (mis)matched weight and weight perceptions predict adolescents’ self-rated health, mental health, and life satisfaction.Design:Quantitative, cross-sectional study.Setting:Data from the 2017-2018 Canadian Community Health Survey (CCHS)—a nationally representative sample collected by Statistics Canada.Participants:Canadian adolescents aged between 12 and 17 (n = 8,081).Measures:The dependent variables are self-rated health, mental health, and life satisfaction. The independent variable is (mis)matched weight and weight perceptions.Analysis:We perform a series of ordinary least squares (OLS) regression models.Results:Overweight adolescents with overweight perceptions are associated with poorer self-rated health (b = −.546, p < .001 for boys; b = −.476, p < .001 for girls), mental health (b = −.278, p < .001 for boys; b = −.433, p < .001 for girls), and life satisfaction (b = −.544, p < .001 for boys; b = −.617, p < .001 for girls) compared to their counterparts with normal weight and normal weight perceptions. Similar patterns have also been observed among normal weight adolescents with overweight perceptions (e.g., normal weight adolescents with overweight perceptions are associated with poorer self-rated health (b = −.541, p < .01 for boys; b = −.447, p < .001 for girls)).Conclusion:Normal weight adolescents are not immune to adverse self-rated health, mental health, and life satisfaction because their weight perceptions are also a contributing factor to health and well-being consequences.
Highlights
The present study examines the extent to whichmatched weight and weight perceptions predict adolescents’ self-rated health, mental health, and life satisfaction
Model 1b showed similar patterns among adolescent girls, suggesting that only overweight adolescent girls were associated with poorer self-rated health compared to their normal weight counterparts (b 1⁄4 À.145, p < .01) and that the levels of self-rated health did not differ between underweight and normal weight adolescent girls (b 1⁄4 .154, p > .05)
Similar patterns had been observed for self-rated life satisfaction, suggesting that adolescents with overweight perceptions were associated with poorer self-rated life satisfaction compared to their counterparts with normal weight perceptions (b 1⁄4 À.591, p < .001 for boys; b 1⁄4 À.662, p < .001 for girls), as shown in Models 3c and 3d
Summary
The present study examines the extent to which (mis)matched weight and weight perceptions predict adolescents’ self-rated health, mental health, and life satisfaction. The high rates of overweight and obesity continue to be an important public health concern among adolescents.[1] In Canada, 24.5% of adolescents aged between 12 and 17 report being overweight or obese.[2] Prior research has well-established that overweight and obesity are negatively associated with adolescents’ health and well-being.[3,4,5,6] Some scholars have recognized the importance of weight perceptions while assessing adolescents’ health and well-being disparities.[7,8,9] these two separate bodies of research have contributed to the literature in significant ways, scholars have yet to explore whether (mis)matched weight and weight perceptions might be linked to greater health and well-being disparities among adolescents, with one exception documenting depressive symptoms in the United States.[10] With this gap in mind, the present study selects Canadian adolescents aged between 12 and 17 from a nationally representative sample—the 2017-2018 Canadian Community Health Survey (CCHS)—to examine the extent to which (mis)matched weight and weight perceptions predict adolescents’ self-rated health, mental health, and life satisfaction. There is evidence that overweight and obese adolescents are linked to lower levels of life satisfaction.[14]
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