First-year college students' weight change is influenced by their randomly assigned roommates' BMI.

ABSTRACT:

Background

There is ongoing debate about whether friends' greater similarity in Body Mass Index (BMI) than non-friends is due to friend selection, shared environments, or peer influence.

Methods

First-year college students (n = 104) from a southwestern U.S. university were randomly assigned roommates during the university's housing process, effectively removing friend selection effects. Participant BMI was measured up to four times (T1-T4) across 2015-2016. The influence of roommate baseline BMI (T1) on change in participant BMI over time (T2-T4) was analyzed using a linear mixed effects model adjusted for individual socio-demographics, linear time trends, baseline BMI, and physical clustering of students. A sensitivity analysis examining floormates was also conducted.

Re

SUBMITTER: van Woerden I 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7685435 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature