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The European Journal of Public Health Advance Access published online on April 6, 2006
The European Journal of Public Health, doi:10.1093/eurpub/ckl050
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© The Author 2006. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the European Public Health Association. All rights reserved.
Received November 11, 2005
Accepted February 10, 2006

Article

Can secondary school students' self-reported measures of height and weight be trusted? An effect size approach

Nikolaos Tsigilis 1 *

1 Department of Physical Education and Sports, University of Thessaly, Greece

* To whom correspondence should be addressed.
Nikolaos Tsigilis, E-mail: tsigilis{at}uom.gr


  Abstract

Background: Self-reported measures of height and weight are a cost-effective alternative to direct measures in large-scale studies. This study was designed to examine the accuracy of adolescent students' self-reported height and weight taking into consideration the magnitude of the differences. Methods: Self-reported height and weight were taken from 300 secondary public schools students. Participants' actual height and weight were subsequently verified. Body mass index (BMI; kg/m2) was calculated separately from reported and from actual measures. Adolescents' whose measured BMI was above the 85th percentile were characterized as ‘at risk for overweight/obese’. Results: There was no gender effect on the discrepancy between reported and actual measures. Overall adolescents significantly underestimated their weight and BMI. Although correlation coefficients were high, eta-square ({eta}2) values indicate large bias for weight (0.36) and BMI (0.31). ‘At risk for overweight/obese’ individuals underestimated their weight and BMI to a greater extent than their ‘normal weight’ counterparts. Conclusions: The magnitude of the discrepancies call into question the accuracy of self-reported weight and consequently the estimated BMI. Correlation coefficients did not provide any valuable information about the discrepancy between the self-reported and actual measures. A better understanding of the validity of self-reported height and weight could be reached if interpretation of the results is based on both statistical significance and magnitude of the differences.

Keywords: adolescents; body mass index; Greece; reproducibility of results.
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