Quote: (05-03-2015 01:38 AM)Zelcorpion Wrote:
That is probably the most exact data available through the official channels - thanks. Still - there is one problem with it as far as I see: I don't believe it fully.
Especially if you select the males and the age group of 20-24 you will find that 50% of Americans between 20-24 are supposedly obese or massively overweight. Even with most European countries - countries where I am at weekly in Eastern and Western Europe it is supposedly 35-40% at ages of 20-24!
I simply don't believe it - one may say that you cannot argue with data, but I would like to know how they came about that data, because when I enter a university in Eastern Europe I have trouble finding 40% overweight and obese students. I'll give you 10-20%, but not 30-40%.
The data was gathered from different sources, and can thus be compared to a review article.
According to the page:
"Data were derived from surveys, reports, and published studies that included data for height and weight, both through physical measurements and self-reports. We used mixed effects linear regression to correct for bias in self-reports."
If you dive into say Polish 20-24 year old females, the rate of overweight is given as 20%, with a 95% uncertainty interval from 13% to 27%. Add to this that educated women are typically more slim than the average. The numbers will then be in line with your Eastern European university experience.
Polish 20-24 guys are shown as 37% (with a 28%-46% uncertainty interval) - indeed higher. This might be partly because the Poles work out a lot and do physical labor, and thus a lot of their weight comes from muscles.