Linkages between obesity, diets and gender. Evidence from Russia

Details

Supervisors

Goedele Van den Broeck

Faculty

Faculté des bioingénieurs

Degree label

Master [120] en sciences agronomiques et industries du vivant, à finalité spécialisée: Agricultural, Food and Environmental Policy Analysis

Abstract

Objectives First, we examined the impact of the female gender on the probability of being obese among Russian adults. Second, we estimated the indirect relationship between gender and obesity, through the diet quality pathway. Third, we estimated the heterogeneous effects between different genders and rural and urban entities. Methods We used national cross-sectional data from the population dietary structure sample survey (2018), on 97856 Russian adults, aged 18-99 years. We constructed the importance of healthy diets variable using principal components analysis, and composite diet quality index using the methodology of DQI-2003. We used a binary logit model for analysis of the impact of the female gender on the probability of being obese. We used a simultaneous equation model to define the impact pathways of the female gender on obesity outcome. Results We showed that being a woman is significantly associated with a 5.5 percentage point increase in the probability of being obese. The nutrition impacts occur through the lower dietary quality, with significant impacts from variety and moderation of diets. The gender obesity gap is higher in rural areas than in urban, with the difference in the prevalence of obesity to be 9 and 4 percentage points, respectively. Among the heterogeneous factors that have different signs and significance for men and women in rural areas are higher education, income, number of children, hours of sitting and hard physical activity during the workday, hours of sleep, and the importance of healthy diets. The determinants of obesity, sign and magnitude of which differ between rural and urban women, are the number of children, hours spent sitting during work, lack of sleep, oversleeping, indicating higher importance of healthy diets, and variety of diets. Our research fulfils the gap in existing research on gender disparities in obesity prevalence in Russia, being the first research accounting for individual’s diet quality.