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An investigation of psychological, social and environmental correlates of obesity and weight gain in young women

International Journal of Obesity volume 30, pages 1240–1249 (2006)Cite this article

Abstract

Objectives:

This study explored the biological, psychological, social and environmental correlates of young women's current weight and retrospective 2-year weight change.

Methods:

A total of 790 young women (mean age 26.8 years), sampled from the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health, provided self-reported data on their height and weight, sociodemographics and a range of biological, psychological, social and environmental variables.

Results:

Several variables from all domains (biological, psychological, social support and environmental) were correlated with higher body mass index, and less strongly greater 2-year weight change. Key correlates included the tendency to never put on weight, no matter what; self-efficacy for avoiding weight gain, and for healthy eating; attention paid to weight; family support and friends’ support/sabotage of physical activity/healthy eating; and perceived difficulty of taking the stairs rather than the elevator as part of the daily routine.

Conclusions:

Intervention strategies aimed at reducing weight gain and obesity may need to focus on social and environmental, as well as psychological factors; however, further research is necessary to confirm these findings given that a number of hypothesized associations were not observed.

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Acknowledgements

Kylie Ball and David Crawford are each supported by a National Health and Medical Research Council/National Heart Foundation Career Development Award. The Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health, which was conceived and developed by groups of interdisciplinary researchers at the Universities of Newcastle and Queensland, is funded by the Commonwealth Department of Health and Ageing. We thank all the participants for their valuable contribution to this project. We gratefully acknowledge Sari Andajani-Sutjahjo for her help with statistical analyses on early versions of this paper.

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  1. Centre for Physical Activity and Nutrition Research, Deakin University, Melbourne, Australia

    K Ball & D Crawford

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  1. K Ball
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  2. D Crawford
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Correspondence to K Ball.

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Ball, K., Crawford, D. An investigation of psychological, social and environmental correlates of obesity and weight gain in young women. Int J Obes 30, 1240–1249 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.ijo.0803267

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