Body Shape Indices in Adolescents Based on the 2009–2012 Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey

A Body Shape Index (ABSI) is a recently proposed index for standardizing waist circumference (WC) for body mass index (BMI) and height in adults, using 2/3 and 1/2 as scaling exponents, respectively. However, ABSI has limited applicability to children and adolescents, as the relationship between height and weight changes with age and varies according to sex. This study aimed to investigate whether ABSI can be applied to adolescents and to analyze the relationships among BMI, WC, height, weight, and body shape index (BSI) in Korean adolescents. The data of 1023 adolescents aged 10–19 years from the 2009–2012 Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey were collected. Body measurements (height, weight, WC, and BMI) were analyzed to estimate the BSI using log-linear regression. The scaling exponents for standardizing WC for weight and height were estimated according to age (per year) and sex. The scaling exponents for standardizing WC for weight and height were 0.698 and −1.090 for boys and 0.646 and −0.855 for girls, respectively. The exponents also differed according to age. BSI was negatively correlated with height, weight, and BMI in boys and girls, and these correlations differed in direction from those in adults. ABSI cannot be applied to adolescents. In adolescents, the BSI is dependent on age and sex and is associated with growth and puberty. Further studies are required to evaluate the association between BSI and other biomarkers, to improve its applicability as a parameter for predicting the risk of chronic diseases in adolescents.