Being married triples the risk of obesity in men, research suggests. Experts found the risks of being overweight increase for both sexes when married, but appear to be particularly acute for men.The research will be presented at the European Congress on Obesity in Spain in May and was carried out on couples in Poland.
Researchers found both men and women tend to be heavier when married, with marriage increasing the risk of being overweight by 62% in men and 39% in women, compared to those who are unmarried. However, married men were also 3.2 times more likely to be obese than unmarried men, while no such link was found for married women when compared to unmarried women.
The lack of such a finding in women may be due to cultural differences in attitudes towards obesity in men and women, the researchers suggested. The study also found that getting older increases the risk of being overweight or obese for both sexes.
Dr Alicja Cicha-Mikolajczyk, from the National Institute of Cardiology, Warsaw, Poland, led the study and suggested reasons for why no link with obesity was found for women. She said: “At an early stage of analysis, we consider different hypothesis that married women are less likely to be obese than married man.
“One of them is a cultural difference in attitude towards obesity. The attitude of society towards women living with obesity is different compared to men – they are more often stigmatised. We assume that women accept life with overweight, but they cannot accept living with obesity and they are more likely than men to take various actions to lose weight (eg: increased physical activity, and even returning to smoking tobacco).”
For the study, data was taken for 2,405 people from the Multi-centre National Population Health Examination Survey. These people were typically aged 50 and 35.3% had normal weight, 38.3% were overweight and 26.4% were obese.People were asked questions regarding their knowledge about health, any depression and social support (such as frequency of contact with family, friends and relatives).
Some 55% of the group had adequate health literacy and at least moderate social support (50%), while 15% reported depression. Each year of increased age increased the risk of being overweight by 3% in men and 4% in women, and the risk of obesity by 4% in men and 6% in women.
In women, having inadequate health literacy increased the risk of obesity by 43%, while reporting at least borderline depression doubled the risk of obesity. This was not found in men. The team concluded: “Age and marital status have undeniable impact on living with overweight or obesity in adulthood regardless of sex.
“In turn, inadequate health literacy and having at least borderline depression were associated with obesity in women. It appears from our results that the dissemination of health knowledge and health promotion across the lifespan could reduce the worrying phenomenon of increasing levels of obesity.”