Eating speed and height loss in relation to overweight: A retrospective study

• Published in: PLOS ONE Vol. 18; no. 4; p. e0284998
• Main Authors: Shimizu, Yuji, Hayakawa, Hidenobu, Honda, Eiko, Sasaki, Nagisa, Takada, Midori, Okada, Takeo, Ohira, Testuya, Kiyama, Masahiko
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Public Library of Science (PLoS) 26.04.2023; Public Library of Science
• Subjects: Age; Analysis; Atherosclerosis; Biology and Life Sciences; Blood pressure; Body mass; Body Mass Index; Body size; Body weight; Body weight gain; Cancer; Cardiovascular disease; Cholesterol; Comparative analysis; Confounding (Statistics); Degenerative disc disease; Diabetes; Disease prevention; Eating; Eating (Physiology); Feeding Behavior; Health aspects; Height; Hemoglobin; Humans; Hypertension; Medicine; Medicine and Health Sciences; Metabolic disorders; Mortality; Overweight; Overweight - epidemiology; Physiological aspects; Q; R; Regression analysis; Research Article; Retrospective Studies; Risk factors; Risk reduction; Science; Values; Variance analysis; Weight; Weight Gain; Workers; Japan
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0284998

Fast eating is an independent risk factor for weight gain. Our previous study involving Japanese workers revealed that overweight (body mass index ≥ 25.0 kg/m 2 ) is an independent risk factor for height loss. However, no studies have clarified the association between eating speed and height loss in relation to overweight status. A retrospective study of 8,982 Japanese workers was conducted. Height loss was defined as being in the highest quintile of height decrease per year. Compared with slow eating, fast eating was revealed to be positively associated with overweight; the fully adjusted odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence interval (CI) was 2.92 (2.29, 3.72). Among non-overweight participants, fast eaters had higher odds of height loss than slow eaters. Among overweight participants, fast eaters had lower odds of height loss; the fully adjusted OR (95% CI) was 1.34 (1.05, 1.71) for non-overweight individuals and 0.52 (0.33, 0.82) for overweight individuals. Since overweight was significantly positively associated with height loss [1.17(1.03, 1.32)], fast eating is not favorable for reducing the risk of height loss among overweight individuals. Those associations indicate that weight gain is not the main cause of height loss among Japanese workers who eat fast.