Exercise or Extra Fries? Behavioral Drivers of Obesity Over the Life Cycle,

Clicks: 30
ID: 327856
2026
Free PDF
Article Quality & Performance Metrics
Overall Quality
Not rated
Combines reader engagement with the AI quality analysis. This article has not been analysed, so there is no overall score — reader engagement is measured and shown alongside.
AI Quality Assessment
Not analyzed
Readership in this journal
Steady

Ranked #17 of 46 articles by views in journal of the european economic association

Most read Least read

Bar heights use a square-root scale.

Mint this article as an NFT
Not yet minted

Create a permanent, verifiable on-chain record of this article on the Scimatic Network. The NFT is held in your Journament account, and you can withdraw it to your own wallet at any time.

5 SUSD one-off · no wallet required
Sign in to mint
Abstract
Abstract As America faces an obesity epidemic and its economic consequences, the factors driving weight variation across the U.S. population remain unclear, especially since these differences extend well beyond commonly studied channels like income or education. We leverage a unique thirty-year panel of U.S. registered nurses to examine the changes in body mass index (BMI) with age, the impact of lifestyle choices on body weight in adulthood, and the role of inherited metabolic traits and childhood preference formation. Our empirical findings reveal that among individuals who enter adulthood with a healthy body mass, those in the top diet quality or exercise deciles at age thirty are roughly 50% more likely to maintain a healthy BMI and avoid morbidities three decades later, compared to those in the bottom deciles. To better understand the drivers of weight gain, we propose a novel structural framework of endogenous BMI evolution where initial heterogeneity is amplified by behaviors to explain much of the observed divergence in weight. Counterfactual experiments using the model indicate that initial conditions, such as fixed metabolic types, account for at least one-third of the variance in weight at older ages. While course correction through behaviors can only partially compensate for poor initial conditions at the onset of adulthood, we find that promoting healthy behaviors in adults can reduce total health care expenses by at least 8% annually.
Reference Key
openalex_W7201982317 Use this key to autocite in the manuscript while using SciMatic Manuscript Manager or Thesis Manager
Authors Neha Bairoliya, Ray Miller, Vegard Mokleiv Nygaard
Are you one of these authors? Claim your profile
Journal journal of the european economic association
Year 2026
DOI
10.1093/jeea/jvag055
URL
https://doi.org/10.1093/jeea/jvag055
Keywords Keywords not found

Citations

No citations found. To add a citation, contact the admin at info@scimatic.org

Comments

No comments yet. Be the first to comment on this article.