Biocultural determinants of overweight-obesity among adult women experiencing the nutritional transition in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Introduction: The African Great Lakes region is experiencing rapid urbanization, which is leading to a nutritional transition and its related chronic diseases. Similar to other Great Lakes countries, the nutritional transition in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is reflected by increased non-communicable diseases, including morbid obesity. The 2014 Demographic Health Survey (DHS) revealed a rising incidence of overweight among women, ranging from 10% in 2001 to 16% in 2014.

Direct and Indirect Determinants of Body Mass Index in Both Major Ethnic Groups Experiencing the Nutritional Transition in Cameroon.

In the context of rapid nutritional transitions in Africa, few studies have analyzed the etiology of obesity by considering the driver pathways that predict body mass index (BMI). The aim of this study is to innovatively identify these driver pathways, including the main sociodemographic and socioecological drivers of BMI. We conducted a rural-urban quantitative study in Cameroon ( = 1106; balanced sex ratio) to explore this issue.

Determinants of energy intake in Central African populations experiencing nutrition transition.

Central Africa is experiencing rapid urbanisation, and this situation comes along with changes in food habits and an increased prevalence of obesity and associated health risks. Factors influencing dietary intake among the diverse African populations are not well understood. Our objective was to characterise the dietary intake and their determinants in the two main ethnic groups experiencing nutrition transition in Cameroon, the Bamiléké and the Béti.

Development and validation of the body shape scale (BOSHAS) for assessing body shape perception in African populations.

Background: As a consequence of 'Western' acculturation, eating disorders and body image disturbances, such as fatness phobia and body dysmorphic disorders towards musculature and body shape, are emerging in Africa, with young people the most affected. It is therefore important to accurately assess perceptions of body shape. However, the existing body image assessment scales lack sufficient accuracy and validity testing to compare body shape perception across different African populations.

Physical Activity and Cardiorespiratory Fitness in Tarahumara and Mestizo Adolescents from Sierra Tarahumara, Mexico.

Objectives: Our purpose was to explore the levels of cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF) and the relationship between CRF, physical activity, and other physical traits in traditional and nontraditional Tarahumara, and Mestizo adolescents from Sierra Tarahumara, Mexico.

Methods: A sample of 87 adolescents aged 16.9 ± 1.

Biocultural determinants of overweight and obesity in the context of nutrition transition in Senegal: a holistic anthropological approach.

Senegal is experiencing a rising obesity epidemic, due to the nutrition transition occurring in most African countries, and driven by sedentary behaviour and high-calorie dietary intake. In addition, the anthropological local drivers of the social valorization of processed high-calorie food and large body sizes could expose the population to obesity risk. This study aimed to determine the impact of these biocultural factors on the nutritional status of Senegalese adults.

Nutrition Transition and Biocultural Determinants of Obesity among Cameroonian Migrants in Urban Cameroon and France.

Native of rural West Cameroon, the Bamiléké population is traditionally predisposed to obesity. Bamiléké who migrated to urban areas additionally experience the nutrition transition. We investigated the biocultural determinants of obesity in Bamiléké who migrated to urban Cameroon (Yaoundé), or urban France (Paris).

Primate energy input and the evolutionary transition to energy-dense diets in humans.

Humans and other large-brained hominins have been proposed to increase energy turnover during their evolutionary history. Such increased energy turnover is plausible, given the evolution of energy-rich diets, but requires empirical confirmation. Framing human energetics in a phylogenetic context, our meta-analysis of 17 wild non-human primate species shows that daily metabolizable energy input follows an allometric relationship with body mass where the allometric exponent for mass is 0.

Development and validation of two food portion photograph books to assess dietary intake among adults and children in Central Africa.

Owing to nutritional transition in Cameroon, one in two adults is overweight and one in five is obese, and 8·1% of children are overweight and 2·1% are obese. Given this phenomenon, dietary intake assessment is needed to establish appropriate preventive nutrition-sensitive strategies. Our aim was to develop and test the validity of two food portion photograph books (FPPB) to be used as visual aids for adults and children taking part in a 24-h dietary recall.

The relevance of the side-view in body image scales for public health: an example from two African populations.

Background: Body size scales are a common method for diagnosing body image disturbances and assessing the cultural valorisation of stoutness, a phenomenon that plays a role in the development of overweight, especially among African populations. Traditionally, body size scales present a front view. In this study, we evaluated a complementary model of representing body shape: the side view of body outlines.

Development and Validation of the Body Size Scale for Assessing Body Weight Perception in African Populations.

Background: The social valorisation of overweight in African populations could promote high-risk eating behaviours and therefore become a risk factor of obesity. However, existing scales to assess body image are usually not accurate enough to allow comparative studies of body weight perception in different African populations. This study aimed to develop and validate the Body Size Scale (BSS) to estimate African body weight perception.

Scaling of free-ranging primate energetics with body mass predicts low energy expenditure in humans.

Studies of how a mammal's daily energy expenditure scales with its body mass suggest that humans, whether Westerners, agro-pastoralists, or hunter-gatherers, all have much lower energy expenditures for their body mass than other mammals. However, non-human primates also differ from other mammals in several life history traits suggestive of low energy use. Judging by field metabolic rates of free-ranging strepsirhine and haplorhine primates with different lifestyle and body mass, estimated using doubly labeled water, primates have lower energy expenditure than other similar-sized eutherian mammals.

Social valorisation of stoutness as a determinant of obesity in the context of nutritional transition in Cameroon: the Bamiléké case.

Body size perceptions were assessed among members of the Bamiléké, an ethnic group in an urban setting in Cameroon with high rates of obesity, but also a positive perception of stoutness in its social representations. We first implemented a qualitative study (April 2007) to identify local representations of body weight among Bamiléké using semi-structured interviews. We then quantitatively assessed body size perceptions among a representative sample of Bamiléké (May to June 2007), employing a body image assessment scale and a questionnaire that included declarative body weight self-satisfaction, health status, and attempts to reduce weight.

Positive selection of protective variants for type 2 diabetes from the Neolithic onward: a case study in Central Asia.

The high prevalence of type 2 diabetes and its uneven distribution among human populations is both a major public health concern and a puzzle in evolutionary biology. Why is this deleterious disease so common, while the associated genetic variants should be removed by natural selection? The 'thrifty genotype' hypothesis proposed that the causal genetic variants were advantageous and selected for during the majority of human evolution. It remains, however, unclear whether genetic data support this scenario.

Is overweight in stunted preschool children in Cameroon related to reductions in fat oxidation, resting energy expenditure and physical activity?

Background: Recent studies suggest that early modifications in metabolic pathways and behaviour, leading to energy conservation and reduced linear growth, could represent adaptations to nutritional constraints during foetal life and infancy. Impaired fat oxidation, low resting energy expenditure and reduced physical activity, resulting from these adaptations, could facilitate fat storage and development of overweight in growth-retarded children that consume more energy-dense food. This study aims at assessing whether: (1) dual-burden preschool children (simultaneously stunted and overweight) of Yaounde (Cameroon) have low birth-weight (indicator of foetal undernutrition) and reductions in fat oxidation, resting energy expenditure (REE) and physical activity, (2) fat oxidation, REE and physical activity are associated with foetal growth.

Development of a new body image assessment scale in urban Cameroon: an anthropological approach.

Objective: Develop and validate body image scales (BIS) presenting real human bodies adapted to the macroscopic phenotype of urban Cameroonian populations.

Design: Quantitative and qualitative analysis.

Setting: Yaoundé, capital city of Cameroon.

Lactase persistence in central Asia: phenotype, genotype, and evolution.

The aim of the present study is to document the evolution of the lactase persistence trait in Central Asia, a geographical area that is thought to have been a region of long-term pastoralism. Several ethnic groups co-exist in this area: Indo-Iranian speakers who are traditionally agriculturist (Tajik) and Turkic speakers who used to be nomadic herders (Kazakh, Karakalpak, Kyrgyz, Turkmen). It was recently demonstrated that horse milking practice existed in the Botai culture of Kazakhstan as early as 5,500 BP ( Outram et al.

Total energy expenditure and body composition in two free-living sympatric lemurs.

Background: Evolutionary theories that account for the unusual socio-ecological traits and life history features of group-living prosimians, compared with other primates, predict behavioral and physiological mechanisms to conserve energy. Low energy output and possible fattening mechanisms are expected, as either an adaptive response to drastic seasonal fluctuations of food supplies in Madagascar, or persisting traits from previously nocturnal hypometabolic ancestors. Free ranging ring-tailed lemurs (Lemur catta) and brown lemurs (Eulemur sp.

Determinants of overweight associated with stunting in preschool children of Yaounde, Cameroon.

Background: Nutrition transition in developing countries has been associated with higher prevalence of overweight.

Aim: The study aimed to identify the factors associated with concurrent stunting and overweight in urban preschool children of Yaounde, Cameroon.

Subjects And Methods: 169 preschool children of both sexes were recruited according to their nutritional status: Stunted, overweight, stunted-overweight, and non-stunted-non-overweight.

Taste acuity of obese adolescents and changes in food neophobia and food preferences during a weight reduction session.

The relationship between taste acuity and food neophobia, food familiarity and liking has been studied in the context of a residential weight reduction session (WRS; mean duration: 10 months) in 39 obese adolescents. Taste acuity was assessed using recognition thresholds for sucrose, citric acid, sodium chloride and 6-n propylthiouracil (PROP) and supra-threshold perceived intensities for sucrose, sodium chloride and PROP. Food neophobia was assessed by using the food neophobia scale at the beginning and at the end of the WRS.

Taste perception in massively obese and in non-obese adolescents.

Objective: The purpose is to determine whether taste functions are different in massively obese adolescents as compared with non-obese adolescents, and to what extent metabolic disorders may interfere with taste perception, as suggested by the results of recent animal studies.

Research Method And Procedures: We compared taste sensitivity and hedonic responses of 39 adolescents with severe early onset obesity (mean BMI: 39.5; min-max: 30.

Food neophobia in the context of a varied diet induced by a weight reduction program in massively obese adolescents.

Previous studies in humans have shown that short to middle-term pre-exposure to multiple foods can reduce the negative response to novel foods (neophobia). In order to explore the effects of a long-term exposure to varied foods on food neophobia, we studied a population of obese adolescents observed in a longitudinal protocol in which the multiple food experiences are induced by a residential weight reduction program (WRP) that encourages the consumption of a wide variety of foods. Seventy-two massively obese adolescents (22 boys) filled the food neophobia scale (FNS, [Pliner, P.

Relationship between taste thresholds and hunger under debate.

We determined taste recognition thresholds for six compounds (sucrose, fructose, sodium chloride, quinine sulphate, PROP and liquorice) in fasting students and, in the same subjects, after a meal. The testing procedure was the staircase-method in blind conditions. Although taste sensitivity may vary with hormonal status, our results did not show any significant difference in taste recognition thresholds between hunger and satiety.

Prevalence of overweight and obesity for urban adults in Cameroon.

Background: The emergence of a nutrition transition in developing countries might lead to higher prevalence of obesity and related adverse health effects. In Cameroon,urbanization growth rate is one of the highest in sub-Saharan Africa. Such dramatic demographic change favours important modifications, notably in nutritional patterns.