The Role of Economic Factors in Obesity Prevalence and Diet Quality in Spain

[eng] Obesity is a growing wide spread epidemic all over the world, in developed as well as developing countries. Taking into account its nature as a complex phenomenon affected by different aspects including economic ones, a growing body of literature has examined the effect of economic factors on...

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Autor: Radwan Ahmed Radwan, Amr
Tipo de recurso: tesis doctoral
Estado:Versión publicada
Fecha de publicación:2014
País:España
Institución:Universidad de Barcelona
Repositorio:Dipòsit Digital de la UB
OAI Identifier:oai:diposit.ub.edu:2445/66169
Acceso en línea:https://hdl.handle.net/2445/66169
http://hdl.handle.net/10803/297831
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Obesitat
Hàbits alimentaris
Salut pública
España
Obesity
Food habits
Public health
Spain
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oai_identifier_str oai:diposit.ub.edu:2445/66169
network_acronym_str ES
network_name_str España
repository_id_str
dc.title.none.fl_str_mv The Role of Economic Factors in Obesity Prevalence and Diet Quality in Spain
title The Role of Economic Factors in Obesity Prevalence and Diet Quality in Spain
spellingShingle The Role of Economic Factors in Obesity Prevalence and Diet Quality in Spain
Radwan Ahmed Radwan, Amr
Obesitat
Hàbits alimentaris
Salut pública
España
Obesity
Food habits
Public health
Spain
title_short The Role of Economic Factors in Obesity Prevalence and Diet Quality in Spain
title_full The Role of Economic Factors in Obesity Prevalence and Diet Quality in Spain
title_fullStr The Role of Economic Factors in Obesity Prevalence and Diet Quality in Spain
title_full_unstemmed The Role of Economic Factors in Obesity Prevalence and Diet Quality in Spain
title_sort The Role of Economic Factors in Obesity Prevalence and Diet Quality in Spain
dc.creator.none.fl_str_mv Radwan Ahmed Radwan, Amr
author Radwan Ahmed Radwan, Amr
author_facet Radwan Ahmed Radwan, Amr
author_role author
dc.contributor.none.fl_str_mv Gil, José M. (José María Gil Roig)
Carrión i Silvestre, Josep Lluís
Universitat de Barcelona. Facultat d'Economia i Empresa
dc.subject.none.fl_str_mv Obesitat
Hàbits alimentaris
Salut pública
España
Obesity
Food habits
Public health
Spain
topic Obesitat
Hàbits alimentaris
Salut pública
España
Obesity
Food habits
Public health
Spain
description [eng] Obesity is a growing wide spread epidemic all over the world, in developed as well as developing countries. Taking into account its nature as a complex phenomenon affected by different aspects including economic ones, a growing body of literature has examined the effect of economic factors on obesity prevalence and the effectiveness of economic intervention policies in combating it. Many papers argue that economics could be a cure as well as one of the main causes of obesity. Despite the increasing obesity rate in Spain, to my knowledge, no known published research studied the economic factors affecting obesity prevalence, only there are some studies about the prevalence of obesity and the importance of socio-demographic factors that are affecting it (SEEDO and results from the project PORGROW)) in which the role of prices and income was neglected. The objective of this thesis has been to analyze the relevance of economic factors (mainly income and other socioeconomic characteristics of Spanish households and market prices) on the prevalence of obesity in Spain and to what extent market intervention prices are effective to reduce obesity and improve the quality of the diet, and under what circumstances. In relation to the existing literature, this thesis project is the first attempt in Spain trying to get an overall picture on the effectiveness of public policies on both food consumption and the quality of diet, on one hand, and on the prevalence of obesity on the other hand. The dissertation is consisted of four papers. The first paper which follows the thesis’ introduction includes a critical review of the literature on the economic approach used to understand and deal with obesity prevalence epidemic, diet quality and public intervention policies. Through the literature review, we also identified the gaps that other papers of the thesis tried to fill. How these gaps were filled by the present thesis and the aforementioned objectives were addressed is the subject the next three chapters of this thesis. In Chapter 3, the determinant factors that affect obesity prevalence were analyzed using a nonparametric approach, the Multivariate Adaptive Regression Splines (MARS). The development and validation process of our new Obesity Specific- Healthy Eating Index (OS-HEI) is discussed in Chapter 4. Chapter 5 deals with the estimation of Spanish consumers demand for food and diet quality, approximated by the BMI, using the EASI demand system and the simulation of the effect of the different price intervention policies on food demand and diet quality in Spain. The thesis ends with some concluding remarks and some suggestions for further research. Although, this study has been proved to be useful in better understanding obesity prevalence and food demand in Spain, it can be extended through applying recent advances in experimental and behavioral economics. The majority of the papers dealing with the role of economic factors on obesity prevalence, including our papers, found economic factors to have a significant but a quite small effect on obesity prevalence. This suggests that non-economic factors are playing the major role in obesity prevalence. Just and Payne (2009) mentioned that because food decisions are made with little cognitive involvement, food policies designed to appeal to highly cognitive thought (e.g., fat taxes, detailed information labels) are likely to have little impact. With the aim of understanding this little impact of such policies and why consumers sometimes behave in ways that contradict standard assumptions of economic analysis and make decisions that prevent them from reaching rationally intended goals, the use of experimental economics tools in future research could be helpful in this pending question.
publishDate 2014
dc.date.none.fl_str_mv 2014
dc.type.none.fl_str_mv info:eu-repo/semantics/doctoralThesis
info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion
format doctoralThesis
status_str publishedVersion
dc.identifier.none.fl_str_mv https://hdl.handle.net/2445/66169
http://hdl.handle.net/10803/297831
url https://hdl.handle.net/2445/66169
http://hdl.handle.net/10803/297831
dc.language.none.fl_str_mv Inglés
language_invalid_str_mv Inglés
dc.rights.none.fl_str_mv (c) Radwan, 2014
info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
rights_invalid_str_mv (c) Radwan, 2014
eu_rights_str_mv openAccess
dc.format.none.fl_str_mv application/pdf
dc.publisher.none.fl_str_mv Universitat de Barcelona
publisher.none.fl_str_mv Universitat de Barcelona
dc.source.none.fl_str_mv Tesis Doctorals - Facultat - Economia i Empresa
reponame:Dipòsit Digital de la UB
instname:Universidad de Barcelona
instname_str Universidad de Barcelona
reponame_str Dipòsit Digital de la UB
collection Dipòsit Digital de la UB
repository.name.fl_str_mv
repository.mail.fl_str_mv
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spelling The Role of Economic Factors in Obesity Prevalence and Diet Quality in SpainRadwan Ahmed Radwan, AmrObesitatHàbits alimentarisSalut públicaEspañaObesityFood habitsPublic healthSpain[eng] Obesity is a growing wide spread epidemic all over the world, in developed as well as developing countries. Taking into account its nature as a complex phenomenon affected by different aspects including economic ones, a growing body of literature has examined the effect of economic factors on obesity prevalence and the effectiveness of economic intervention policies in combating it. Many papers argue that economics could be a cure as well as one of the main causes of obesity. Despite the increasing obesity rate in Spain, to my knowledge, no known published research studied the economic factors affecting obesity prevalence, only there are some studies about the prevalence of obesity and the importance of socio-demographic factors that are affecting it (SEEDO and results from the project PORGROW)) in which the role of prices and income was neglected. The objective of this thesis has been to analyze the relevance of economic factors (mainly income and other socioeconomic characteristics of Spanish households and market prices) on the prevalence of obesity in Spain and to what extent market intervention prices are effective to reduce obesity and improve the quality of the diet, and under what circumstances. In relation to the existing literature, this thesis project is the first attempt in Spain trying to get an overall picture on the effectiveness of public policies on both food consumption and the quality of diet, on one hand, and on the prevalence of obesity on the other hand. The dissertation is consisted of four papers. The first paper which follows the thesis’ introduction includes a critical review of the literature on the economic approach used to understand and deal with obesity prevalence epidemic, diet quality and public intervention policies. Through the literature review, we also identified the gaps that other papers of the thesis tried to fill. How these gaps were filled by the present thesis and the aforementioned objectives were addressed is the subject the next three chapters of this thesis. In Chapter 3, the determinant factors that affect obesity prevalence were analyzed using a nonparametric approach, the Multivariate Adaptive Regression Splines (MARS). The development and validation process of our new Obesity Specific- Healthy Eating Index (OS-HEI) is discussed in Chapter 4. Chapter 5 deals with the estimation of Spanish consumers demand for food and diet quality, approximated by the BMI, using the EASI demand system and the simulation of the effect of the different price intervention policies on food demand and diet quality in Spain. The thesis ends with some concluding remarks and some suggestions for further research. Although, this study has been proved to be useful in better understanding obesity prevalence and food demand in Spain, it can be extended through applying recent advances in experimental and behavioral economics. The majority of the papers dealing with the role of economic factors on obesity prevalence, including our papers, found economic factors to have a significant but a quite small effect on obesity prevalence. This suggests that non-economic factors are playing the major role in obesity prevalence. Just and Payne (2009) mentioned that because food decisions are made with little cognitive involvement, food policies designed to appeal to highly cognitive thought (e.g., fat taxes, detailed information labels) are likely to have little impact. With the aim of understanding this little impact of such policies and why consumers sometimes behave in ways that contradict standard assumptions of economic analysis and make decisions that prevent them from reaching rationally intended goals, the use of experimental economics tools in future research could be helpful in this pending question.Universitat de BarcelonaGil, José M. (José María Gil Roig)Carrión i Silvestre, Josep LluísUniversitat de Barcelona. Facultat d'Economia i Empresa2014info:eu-repo/semantics/doctoralThesisinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersionapplication/pdfhttps://hdl.handle.net/2445/66169http://hdl.handle.net/10803/297831Tesis Doctorals - Facultat - Economia i Empresareponame:Dipòsit Digital de la UBinstname:Universidad de BarcelonaInglés(c) Radwan, 2014info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccessoai:diposit.ub.edu:2445/661692026-05-27T06:46:51Z
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