IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ehbiol/v26y2017icp96-111.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Health and weight – gender-specific linkages under heterogeneity, interdependence and resilience factors

Author

Listed:
  • Hübler, Olaf

Abstract

Many studies have shown that obesity is a serious health problem for our society. Empirical analyses often neglect a number of methodological issues and relevant influences on health. This paper investigates empirically whether neglecting these items leads to systematically different estimates. Based on data from the German Socio-Economic Panel, this study derives the following results. (1) Many combinations of weight and height lead to the same health status. (2) The relationship between health and body mass index is nonlinear. (3) Underweight strengthens individual health and severe obesity has a clear negative impact on health status. Underweight women are more affected than men but obese men are hit harder than women. (4) The hypothesis has to be rejected that weight has an exogenous influence on health. (5) A worse health status is linked with weight fluctuations and deviations between desired and actual working hours. (6) A healthy diet and long but not too long sleeping contribute to a good health status. Moreover, a good parental education and a high parental social status act favorably on health as does personal high income. (7) Four of the big five components of personality, namely openness, extraversion, conscientiousness and agreeableness, contribute to resilience against health problems.

Suggested Citation

  • Hübler, Olaf, 2017. "Health and weight – gender-specific linkages under heterogeneity, interdependence and resilience factors," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 26(C), pages 96-111.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ehbiol:v:26:y:2017:i:c:p:96-111
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ehb.2017.03.001
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1570677X16301046
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.ehb.2017.03.001?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jay Bhattacharya & Neeraj Sood, 2011. "Who Pays for Obesity?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 25(1), pages 139-158, Winter.
    2. Olaf Hübler, 2017. "Men earn less under working time accounts: a puzzle?," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(1), pages 4-7, January.
    3. Sabia, Joseph J. & Rees, Daniel I., 2012. "Body weight and wages: Evidence from Add Health," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 10(1), pages 14-19.
    4. Sonia Bhalotra & Martin Karlsson & Therese Nilsson & Nina Schwarz, 2022. "Infant Health, Cognitive Performance, and Earnings: Evidence from Inception of the Welfare State in Sweden," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 104(6), pages 1138-1156, November.
    5. Batty, G. David & Shipley, Martin J. & Gunnell, David & Huxley, Rachel & Kivimaki, Mika & Woodward, Mark & Lee, Crystal Man Ying & Smith, George Davey, 2009. "Height, wealth, and health: An overview with new data from three longitudinal studies," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 7(2), pages 137-152, July.
    6. Marx, Brian D. & Eilers, Paul H. C., 1998. "Direct generalized additive modeling with penalized likelihood," Computational Statistics & Data Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 28(2), pages 193-209, August.
    7. Anke Becker & Thomas Deckers & Thomas Dohmen & Armin Falk & Fabian Kosse, 2012. "The Relationship Between Economic Preferences and Psychological Personality Measures," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 4(1), pages 453-478, July.
    8. Eckhardt Bode & Stephan Brunow & Ingrid Ott & Alina Sorgner, 2019. "Worker Personality: Another Skill Bias beyond Education in the Digital Age," German Economic Review, Verein für Socialpolitik, vol. 20(4), pages 254-294, November.
    9. Lindahl, Mikael & Björkegren, Evelina & Palme, Mårten & Simeonova, Emilia, 2016. "Parental Influences on Health and Longevity: Lessons from a Large Sample of Adoptees," IZA Discussion Papers 9688, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    10. Dora L. Costa, 2015. "Health and the Economy in the United States from 1750 to the Present," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 53(3), pages 503-570, September.
    11. Maclean, Johanna Catherine & Xu, Haiyong & French, Michael T. & Ettner, Susan L., 2014. "Personality disorders and body weight," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 12(C), pages 153-171.
    12. Samuel H. Preston & Andrew Stokes & Neil K. Mehta & Bochen Cao, 2012. "Projecting the Effect of Changes in Smoking and Obesity on Future Life Expectancy in the United States," NBER Working Papers 18407, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Cragg, John G. & Donald, Stephen G., 1997. "Inferring the rank of a matrix," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 76(1-2), pages 223-250.
    14. Joseph G. Altonji & Robert A. Shakotko, 1987. "Do Wages Rise with Job Seniority?," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 54(3), pages 437-459.
    15. Oswald, Andrew J & Powdthavee, Nattavudh, 2007. "Obesity, Unhappiness, and The Challenge of Affluence : Theory and Evidence," The Warwick Economics Research Paper Series (TWERPS) 793, University of Warwick, Department of Economics.
    16. Breusch, T S & Pagan, A R, 1979. "A Simple Test for Heteroscedasticity and Random Coefficient Variation," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 47(5), pages 1287-1294, September.
    17. Patrick Royston & Douglas G. Altman, 1994. "Regression Using Fractional Polynomials of Continuous Covariates: Parsimonious Parametric Modelling," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series C, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 43(3), pages 429-453, September.
    18. Johansson, Edvard & Böckerman, Petri & Kiiskinen, Urpo & Heliövaara, Markku, 2009. "Obesity and labour market success in Finland: The difference between having a high BMI and being fat," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 7(1), pages 36-45, March.
    19. Ruppert,David & Wand,M. P. & Carroll,R. J., 2003. "Semiparametric Regression," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521780506.
    20. Gert G. Wagner & Joachim R. Frick & Jürgen Schupp, 2007. "The German Socio-Economic Panel Study (SOEP) – Scope, Evolution and Enhancements," Schmollers Jahrbuch : Journal of Applied Social Science Studies / Zeitschrift für Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin, vol. 127(1), pages 139-169.
    21. Steffen Otterbach & Mark Wooden & Yin King Fok, 2016. "Working-Time Mismatch and Mental Health," Melbourne Institute Working Paper Series wp2016n11, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, The University of Melbourne.
    22. Wehby, George L. & Murray, Jeffrey C. & Wilcox, Allen & Lie, Rolv T., 2012. "Smoking and body weight: Evidence using genetic instruments," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 113-126.
    23. Arthur Lewbel, 2012. "Using Heteroscedasticity to Identify and Estimate Mismeasured and Endogenous Regressor Models," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 30(1), pages 67-80.
    24. Andrews,Donald W. K. & Stock,James H. (ed.), 2005. "Identification and Inference for Econometric Models," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521844413.
    25. Böckerman, Petri & Maczulskij, Terhi, 2016. "The Education-health Nexus: Fact and fiction," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 150(C), pages 112-116.
    26. Hübler, Olaf, 2017. "Health and Body Mass Index: No Simple Relationship," IZA Discussion Papers 10620, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    27. Ruppert,David & Wand,M. P. & Carroll,R. J., 2003. "Semiparametric Regression," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521785167.
    28. Wehner, Caroline & Schils, Trudie & Borghans, Lex, 2016. "Personality and Mental Health: The Role and Substitution Effect of Emotional Stability and Conscientiousness," IZA Discussion Papers 10337, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    29. Avner Offer, 2006. "The challenge of affluence: self-control and well-being since 1950," Working Papers 6020, Economic History Society.
    30. Andrew J. Oswald & Nattavudh Powdthavee, 2007. "Review 1: Obesity, Unhappiness, and The Challenge of Affluence: Theory and Evidence," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 117(521), pages 441-454, June.
    31. Inyoung Kim & Noah D. Cohen & Raymond J. Carroll, 2003. "Semiparametric Regression Splines in Matched Case-Control Studies," Biometrics, The International Biometric Society, vol. 59(4), pages 1158-1169, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Hübler, Olaf, 2019. "The Role of Body Weight for Health, Earnings and Life Satisfaction," IZA Discussion Papers 12078, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Bellmann, Lutz & Hübler, Olaf, 2019. "Personal Attitudes, Job Characteristics and Health," IZA Discussion Papers 12597, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    3. Hübler Olaf, 2020. "The Gender-specific Role of Body Weight for Health, Earnings and Life Satisfaction in Piecewise and Simultaneous Equations Models," Journal of Economics and Statistics (Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik), De Gruyter, vol. 240(5), pages 653-676, October.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Hübler, Olaf, 2017. "Health and Body Mass Index: No Simple Relationship," IZA Discussion Papers 10620, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Hübler Olaf, 2020. "The Gender-specific Role of Body Weight for Health, Earnings and Life Satisfaction in Piecewise and Simultaneous Equations Models," Journal of Economics and Statistics (Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik), De Gruyter, vol. 240(5), pages 653-676, October.
    3. Hübler, Olaf, 2019. "The Role of Body Weight for Health, Earnings and Life Satisfaction," IZA Discussion Papers 12078, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    4. Alois Stutzer & Armando N. Meier, 2016. "Limited Self‐control, Obesity, and the Loss of Happiness," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 25(11), pages 1409-1424, November.
    5. Lutz Bellmann & Olaf Hübler, 2022. "Personality traits, working conditions and health: an empirical analysis based on the German Linked Personnel Panel, 2013–2017," Review of Managerial Science, Springer, vol. 16(2), pages 283-318, February.
    6. Morteza Amini & Mahdi Roozbeh & Nur Anisah Mohamed, 2024. "Separation of the Linear and Nonlinear Covariates in the Sparse Semi-Parametric Regression Model in the Presence of Outliers," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 12(2), pages 1-17, January.
    7. Clark, Andrew E. & Etilé, Fabrice, 2011. "Happy house: Spousal weight and individual well-being," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(5), pages 1124-1136.
    8. Takuma Yoshida, 2019. "Two stage smoothing in additive models with missing covariates," Statistical Papers, Springer, vol. 60(6), pages 1803-1826, December.
    9. Lee, Wang-Sheng & McKinnish, Terra, 2019. "Locus of control and marital satisfaction: Couple perspectives using Australian data," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 74(C).
    10. Bellmann, Lutz & Hübler, Olaf, 2019. "Personal Attitudes, Job Characteristics and Health," IZA Discussion Papers 12597, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    11. Md Nazmul Ahsan & Inas Rashad Kelly, 2018. "Earnings Gaps for Conspicuous Characteristics: Evidence from Indonesia," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 85(1), pages 121-141, July.
    12. Arūnas P. Verbyla & Joanne Faveri & John D. Wilkie & Tom Lewis, 2018. "Tensor Cubic Smoothing Splines in Designed Experiments Requiring Residual Modelling," Journal of Agricultural, Biological and Environmental Statistics, Springer;The International Biometric Society;American Statistical Association, vol. 23(4), pages 478-508, December.
    13. Cui, Xia & Zhao, Weihua & Lian, Heng & Liang, Hua, 2019. "Pursuit of dynamic structure in quantile additive models with longitudinal data," Computational Statistics & Data Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 130(C), pages 42-60.
    14. Otto-Sobotka, Fabian & Salvati, Nicola & Ranalli, Maria Giovanna & Kneib, Thomas, 2019. "Adaptive semiparametric M-quantile regression," Econometrics and Statistics, Elsevier, vol. 11(C), pages 116-129.
    15. Timothy K.M. Beatty & Erling Røed Larsen, 2005. "Using Engel curves to estimate bias in the Canadian CPI as a cost of living index," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 38(2), pages 482-499, May.
    16. Arthur Charpentier & Emmanuel Flachaire & Antoine Ly, 2017. "Econom\'etrie et Machine Learning," Papers 1708.06992, arXiv.org, revised Mar 2018.
    17. Hyunju Son & Youyi Fong, 2021. "Fast grid search and bootstrap‐based inference for continuous two‐phase polynomial regression models," Environmetrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 32(3), May.
    18. Michael Wegener & Göran Kauermann, 2017. "Forecasting in nonlinear univariate time series using penalized splines," Statistical Papers, Springer, vol. 58(3), pages 557-576, September.
    19. Dlugosz, Stephan & Mammen, Enno & Wilke, Ralf A., 2017. "Generalized partially linear regression with misclassified data and an application to labour market transitions," Computational Statistics & Data Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 145-159.
    20. Bernhard Baumgartner & Daniel Guhl & Thomas Kneib & Winfried J. Steiner, 2018. "Flexible estimation of time-varying effects for frequently purchased retail goods: a modeling approach based on household panel data," OR Spectrum: Quantitative Approaches in Management, Springer;Gesellschaft für Operations Research e.V., vol. 40(4), pages 837-873, October.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:ehbiol:v:26:y:2017:i:c:p:96-111. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/622964 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.