[Overweight in Italian early adolescents: association with psychosomatic symptoms].

OBJECTIVE

to describe the association between overweight and a number of somatic and psychological complaints within a sample of Italian early-adolescents and adolescents.

DESIGN

the study is apart of the larger transnational study "Health Behaviour in School Aged Children" (HBSC), coordinated by the European Office of the World Health Organization. The data were collected through self-completed questionnaires on forms which had been devised by the international research group. The main areas covered in the questionnaire were health and health behaviour.

SETTING

151 middle schools and 92 high schools were randomly selected from all Italian public and private schools.

PARTICIPANTS

the questionnaire was filled out by 4386 youngsters (48.4% males).

MEASURES

main outcomes which have been measured include Body Mass Index, and Psychological and Somatic Complaints.

RESULTS

the incidence of overweight was correlated to headache (7.8% vs. 4.5% non-overweight) and backache (6.4% vs. 2.8%) in males but not in females. Overweight males (9.5% vs. 6.5%) and females (22.0% vs. 13.2%) reported feeling alow, more often than participants of normal weight. Overweight co-occurred with irritability (15.1% vs. 8.0%) only in female participants.

CONCLUSION

overweight is associated with a poor quality of life in early-adolescence and adolescence. The co-occurrence of overweight and psychosomatic symptoms is different in males and females.