A high socioeconomic status is associated with better health and a longer life. In rich countries, the tallest and slimmest seem to have a greater chance of succeeding , but the way in which these relationships between physical condition and social condition develop has not been sufficiently studied.
Now an investigation by American and British scientists led by Professor Timothy Frayling (University of Exeter, UK) has provided the strongest evidence yet that genetically overweight people (especially women) are in a unfavorable socioeconomic situation ; and that taller individuals from birth (especially men) enjoy more educational, employment and economic opportunities.
To find the links between weight, height and social position, Frayling’s team analyzed 119,000 Britons aged 40 to 70 for genetic variants known to influence height and body mass index (BMI) . That information is held by the UK Biobank, a biological database of nearly half a million UK adults.
The researchers compared this information with the current height and weight of the subjects studied, and with five parameters of their lives: age at which they completed their education; educational level achieved; type of job; annual household income; and the “Townsend Index”, a recognized poverty measurement tool. The analyzes were repeated separately for men and women.
The data were conclusive: a lower stature of genetic origin increases the probabilities of having low levels of education, worse jobs and less income , especially in the case of men; Too high a BMI is related to lower wages and greater social exclusion in women.
Why does this happen? According to the authors of the work, it has to do with the complex interaction between self-esteem, the social stigma that being short or fat still entails, and positive discrimination in favor of the good-looking. However, they acknowledge that more research is needed to clarify the relationship between physical traits and socioeconomic status.
