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BMC Public Health
Published in: BMC Public Health 1/2018

Open Access 01-12-2018 | Research article

Association between body mass index and health outcomes among adolescents: the mediating role of traditional and cyber bullying victimization

Authors: Byung Lee, Seokjin Jeong, Myunghoon Roh

Published in: BMC Public Health | Issue 1/2018

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Abstract

Background

It is well-documented that obese children and adolescents tend to experience a variety of negative physical and psychological health consequences. Despite the association between obesity and physical and psychological well-being, few studies have examined the role of off-line and on-line forms of bullying victimization in this link. The main objective of the current study is to investigate the direct and mediating effects of traditional and cyber bullying victimization in explaining the relationship between the body mass index (BMI) and physical/psychological distress.

Methods

A nationally representative sample of 10,160 school children (mean age = 12.95 ± 1.75) were collected from the 2009 Health Behavior in School-aged Children (HBSC) study. Data were collected on body mass index, physical and psychological health, bullying victimization experience, and demographic information. A seemingly unrelated regression (SUR) was employed to assess and compare the indirect effects in multiple mediation models.

Results

While a significant direct association was found between BMI and both physical and psychological health, the indirect effect of BMI on physical distress was significant only via traditional bullying victimization. Both forms of bullying victimization had a mediating impact between BMI and psychological distress. However, the indirect effect on psychological distress was manifested through a negative mediating role of cyberbullying victimization. The negative relation between cyberbullying victimization and psychological distress warrants further exploration.

Conclusions

Obesity represents a serious risk to adolescent health and well-being, both physically and psychologically. If becoming a victim of traditional bullying mediates (specifically exacerbates) the level of physical and psychological distress among obese and overweight adolescents, health professionals need to focus on raising awareness of the importance of weight-based victimization for children and adolescents with obesity. School administrators and teachers could increase the efforts to identify school-age children who are stigmatized for their weight and recommend coping strategies for distressed victims of traditional and cyberbullying.
Footnotes
1
Participants were given a definition of “being bullied” as follows: A student is being bullied when another student, or a group of students, say or do nasty or unpleasant things to him or her. It is also bullying when a student is teased repeatedly in a way he or she does not like or when they are deliberately left out of things. But it is not bullying when two students of about the same strength or power argue or fight. It is also not bullying when a student is teased in a friendly and playful way.
 
2
According to the Center for Disease Control’s BMI category, the raw BMI score for boys and girls is different. However, the CDC adjust raw BMI score into BMI categories based upon centralized-percentiles cutoffs regardless of participants’ sex. (See BMI-for-age charts). Therefore, the interpretation of BMI is not different.
 
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Metadata
Title
Association between body mass index and health outcomes among adolescents: the mediating role of traditional and cyber bullying victimization
Authors
Byung Lee
Seokjin Jeong
Myunghoon Roh
Publication date
01-12-2018
Publisher
BioMed Central
Published in
BMC Public Health / Issue 1/2018
Electronic ISSN: 1471-2458
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-018-5390-0

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