title: The shape of things to come? Obesity prevalence among foreign-born vs. US-born Mexican youth in California.
abstract: Obesity among the Mexican-origin adult population in the US has been associated with longer stays in the US and with being US- vs. Mexican-born, two proxies for acculturation. This pattern is less clear for Mexican-origin children and young adults: recent evidence suggests that it may be reversed, with foreign-born Mexican youth in the US at higher risk of obesity than their US-born Mexican-American counterparts. The objective of this study is to evaluate the hypothesis that the immigrant advantage in obesity prevalence for Mexican-origin populations in the US does not hold for children and young adults. We use data from the Los Angeles Family and Neighborhood Survey (N = 1143) and the California Health Interview Survey (N = 25,487) for respondents ages 4-24 to calculate the odds of overweight/obesity by ethnicity and nativity. We find support for the hypothesis that overweight/obesity prevalence is not significantly lower for first-generation compared to second- and third-generation Mexican-origin youth. Significantly higher obesity prevalence among the first generation was observed for young adult males (ages 18-24) and adolescent females (ages 12-17). The previously-observed protective effect against obesity risk among recent adult immigrants does not hold for Mexican-origin youth.
authors.affiliation: Department of Family and Community Health, School of Nursing, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA. abutt@nursing.upenn.edu
authors.forename: Alison M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Buttenheim
authors.forename: Anne R
authors.initials: AR
authors.lastname: Pebley
authors.forename: Katie
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Hsih
authors.forename: Chang Y
authors.initials: CY
authors.lastname: Chung
authors.forename: Noreen
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Goldman
mesh_terms: D000069:Acculturation; D000293:Adolescent; D017677:Age Distribution; D002140:California / Q000453:epidemiology; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D054242:Emigrants and Immigrants / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D005260:Female; D006306:Health Surveys; D006801:Humans; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D015141:Los Angeles / Q000453:epidemiology; D008297:Male; D017058:Mexican Americans / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D008800:Mexico / Q000208:ethnology; D009765:Obesity / Q000208:ethnology*; D015995:Prevalence; D012307:Risk Factors; D055815:Young Adult