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The Strength of Social Interactions and Obesity among Women

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Agent-Based Computational Modelling

Part of the book series: Contributions to Economics ((CE))

Summary

In order to explain the differences in obesity rates among women in the United States by education, we model a social process in which body weight norms are determined endogenously in relation to the weight distribution of the peer group. The model features biologically grounded variation in metabolism, and enables us to describe a complete distribution of weights in equilibrium. We assume that individuals compare themselves to others with the same level of education, and that the importance of conforming to the group weight norm increases with education status. Consistent with observed body weights among women in the United States, the model predicts lower average weights and less dispersion of weight among more educated women.

We are grateful for the comments of two anonymous referees. An extended version of this article including the FORTRAN90 code used to solve the model can be found online at http://mailer.fsu.edu/~fheiland/research.htm.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Research Department, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, USA

    Mary A. Burke

  2. Department of Economics, School of Computational Science and Center for Demography and Population Health, Florida State University, Tallahassee, USA

    Frank Heiland

Authors
  1. Mary A. Burke
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  2. Frank Heiland
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Instituto di Metodi Quantitativi, Università Bocconi & IGIER, Viale Isonzo 25, 20135, Milano, Italy

    Francesco C. Billari

  2. Vienna Institute of Demography, Prinz Eugen-Straße 8-10, 1040, Vienna, Austria

    Thomas Fent  & Alexia Prskawetz  & 

  3. ACDIS, University of Illinois, 505 East Armory Ave., Champaign, IL, 61820, USA

    Jürgen Scheffran

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© 2006 Physica-Verlag Heidelberg

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Burke, M.A., Heiland, F. (2006). The Strength of Social Interactions and Obesity among Women. In: Billari, F.C., Fent, T., Prskawetz, A., Scheffran, J. (eds) Agent-Based Computational Modelling. Contributions to Economics. Physica-Verlag HD. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-7908-1721-X_6

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