Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Increasing obesity rates among Americans is a serious issue in the United States, especially among younger populations. A growing body of research has investigated the relationship between socioeconomic status and obesity. However, most of this research focuses on adults. There has been very little nationally representative research, which specifically looks at the relationship between poverty and obesity in children and adolescents over time. This paper investigates the relationship between family poverty status and obesity status in adolescence over time and into young adulthood using three waves of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health) and multinomial logistic regression. In addition, this paper models possible mediating mechanisms, stemming from economic, sociological and nutrition-based theories that help to explain the links between poverty and obesity. The argument of this article is that research that investigates the empirical relationship between obesity and poverty status must go beyond simply measuring poverty status but also include measures that capture the experience of poverty, which better explain what it is about poverty that causes obesity in the U.S. This analysis finds factors that describe family context for adolescents significantly affect their obesity status later in life (roughly six year later). Family poverty status, maternal full-time work status and neighborhood poverty have enduring effects on adolescents’ obesity status as they move into young adulthood.

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