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Differences in educational attainment between obese and non-obese Kuwaiti female university students
Individuals with obesity tend to perform less well than their non-obese peers in tertiary education, but there is little evidence from non-Western countries and recent studies. The present study aimed to test whether academic attainment differed between female undergraduates with obesity (defined by...
Autores principales: | , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Cambridge University Press
2020
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7443771/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32913642 http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/jns.2020.24 |
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author | Al Hammadi, Hanouf H. Alaslawi, Hamad A. Hewitt, Allan Reilly, John J. |
author_facet | Al Hammadi, Hanouf H. Alaslawi, Hamad A. Hewitt, Allan Reilly, John J. |
author_sort | Al Hammadi, Hanouf H. |
collection | PubMed |
description | Individuals with obesity tend to perform less well than their non-obese peers in tertiary education, but there is little evidence from non-Western countries and recent studies. The present study aimed to test whether academic attainment differed between female undergraduates with obesity (defined by body mass index (BMI)), and those who were non-obese in Kuwait, a country with very high obesity prevalence. In 400 female Kuwaiti first- and second-year Social Science students (mean age 18⋅0, sd 0⋅6 years), educational attainment was defined as the Grade Point Average (GPA) across all subjects (from 1⋅00 to 4⋅00). The mean GPA (2⋅51, sd 0⋅53) among students defined as obese by the BMI (n 163) was significantly lower than among the students defined as non-obese by the BMI (n 237; 2⋅80, sd 0⋅63; P < 0⋅001), and those defined as obese were more likely to be in the lowest quartile for the GPA (OR 3⋅03; 95% CI 1⋅90, 4⋅85), independent of socio-economic status. Similar differences were observed between students defined as having high versus normal body fatness. Female undergraduates in Kuwait with obesity have lower academic attainment than their non-obese peers, and universities should consider measures to mitigate reduced attainment among their female undergraduates. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-7443771 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2020 |
publisher | Cambridge University Press |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-74437712020-09-09 Differences in educational attainment between obese and non-obese Kuwaiti female university students Al Hammadi, Hanouf H. Alaslawi, Hamad A. Hewitt, Allan Reilly, John J. J Nutr Sci Research Article Individuals with obesity tend to perform less well than their non-obese peers in tertiary education, but there is little evidence from non-Western countries and recent studies. The present study aimed to test whether academic attainment differed between female undergraduates with obesity (defined by body mass index (BMI)), and those who were non-obese in Kuwait, a country with very high obesity prevalence. In 400 female Kuwaiti first- and second-year Social Science students (mean age 18⋅0, sd 0⋅6 years), educational attainment was defined as the Grade Point Average (GPA) across all subjects (from 1⋅00 to 4⋅00). The mean GPA (2⋅51, sd 0⋅53) among students defined as obese by the BMI (n 163) was significantly lower than among the students defined as non-obese by the BMI (n 237; 2⋅80, sd 0⋅63; P < 0⋅001), and those defined as obese were more likely to be in the lowest quartile for the GPA (OR 3⋅03; 95% CI 1⋅90, 4⋅85), independent of socio-economic status. Similar differences were observed between students defined as having high versus normal body fatness. Female undergraduates in Kuwait with obesity have lower academic attainment than their non-obese peers, and universities should consider measures to mitigate reduced attainment among their female undergraduates. Cambridge University Press 2020-07-24 /pmc/articles/PMC7443771/ /pubmed/32913642 http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/jns.2020.24 Text en © The Author(s) 2020 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
spellingShingle | Research Article Al Hammadi, Hanouf H. Alaslawi, Hamad A. Hewitt, Allan Reilly, John J. Differences in educational attainment between obese and non-obese Kuwaiti female university students |
title | Differences in educational attainment between obese and non-obese Kuwaiti female university students |
title_full | Differences in educational attainment between obese and non-obese Kuwaiti female university students |
title_fullStr | Differences in educational attainment between obese and non-obese Kuwaiti female university students |
title_full_unstemmed | Differences in educational attainment between obese and non-obese Kuwaiti female university students |
title_short | Differences in educational attainment between obese and non-obese Kuwaiti female university students |
title_sort | differences in educational attainment between obese and non-obese kuwaiti female university students |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7443771/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32913642 http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/jns.2020.24 |
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