Social Factors in Childhood and Adulthood Associated with Adult Obesity in African American and White Women

Table 1

Comparison of participant characteristics by race.

	African American females (𝑛=811)		White females (𝑛=175)		t-test
	Mean	SD	Mean	SD	𝑃 value
Demographic characteristics
Age, mean (SD)	30.12	1.5	29.93	1.44	0.134
Years of education	12.75	2.07	10.92	2	<0.001
Percentage with college degree or above	14.61	35.34	2.89	16.8	<0.001
Number of assets	2.49	2.16	3.2	2.15	<0.001
Average family income ($)	$31,825	$22,384	$35,164	$24,818	0.188
Average personal income ($)	$16,077	$12,194	$12,235	$11,993	0.001
Number of children	1.49	1.33	1.59	1.21	0.388
Percentage married	27.18	44.52	59.41	49.25	<0.001
Age at first child’s birth	23.61	5.22	23.32	5.07	0.504
Percent below poverty level	32.94	47.04	27.74	44.91	0.216
Health characteristics
BMI	26.56	6.13	26.13	6.29	0.422
Percent overweight	36.05	48.06	30.95	46.41	0.278
Percent obese	24.58	43.08	25.00	43.43	0.908
Percent current smoker	42.62	49.48	53.18	50.04	0.011
Percent with very good/excellent self-reported health	56.03	49.67	54.12	49.98	0.650
Adult neighborhood characteristics
Median household income ($)	$25,323	$10,616	$33,352	$12,641	<0.001
Percent African American	72.17	31.29	8.06	11.73	<0.001
Percent poor neighborhood	35.42	15.9	24.77	12.48	<0.001
Childhood neighborhood and personal characteristics
Percent African American	72.8	33.44	8.95	19	<0.001
Mother married at time of birth (%)	66.92	47.08	87.86	32.75	<0.001
Mother married to father at age 8 (%)	60.17	48.98	70.86	45.57	<0.001
Percent not on welfare as child/adult	41.3	49.26	29.71	45.83	0.004
Percent poor neighborhood	22.36	15.49	13.33	11.2	<0.001
Household below poverty level (%)	31.81	46.6	32.57	46.99	0.845
Overweight as child (%)	5.15	22.12	4.65	21.12	0.787
At risk for overweight as child (%)	7.79	26.82	8.72	28.3	0.683