Relative body weight and psychological distress in late life: observations of gender and race comparisons.
OBJECTIVE
This study examines the association between relative body weight (measured with body mass index; BMI) and multiple forms of psychological distress and whether those associations are contingent on gender and race.


METHODS
Interviews were conducted in 2001-2002 with persons 65 years and older in the District of Columbia and adjoining Maryland counties (N = 1,152). BMI is associated (a) positively with depression, anger, and physical symptoms among White women; (b) positively with physical symptoms among Black women and men; and (c) negatively with anxiety among White men.


RESULTS
Tests for gender by race interactions find significant contrasts between White women and men when depression, anxiety, and physical symptoms are considered as outcomes; contrasts between White and Black women are significant for anger.


CONCLUSIONS
Results underscore the importance of gender by race interactions, multiple forms of distress in analyses of effects of BMI, and the role of negative self-evaluations and health difficulties as explanations.
Schieman
Scott
S
Department of Sociology, University of Toronto, 725 Spadina Ave., Toronto, ON M5S 2J4, Canada. scott.schieman@utoronto.ca.
McMullen
Taralyn
T
Swan
Meagan
M
D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000786:Anger; D001007:Anxiety; D044383:Black People; D015992:Body Mass Index; D001835:Body Weight; D003863:Depression; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D012044:Regression Analysis; D012649:Self Concept; D012737:Sex Factors; D013315:Stress, Psychological; D014481:United States; D044465:White People; D001741:Black or African American