Am J Clin Nutr. 2022 Jan 14:nqac005. doi: 10.1093/ajcn/nqac005. Online ahead of print.
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Visualizations of the emerging obesity epidemic, such as with serial United States (US) color prevalence maps, provide graphic images that extend informative public health messages beyond those in written communications. Advances in low-cost 3D optical technology now allows for development of large image databases that include participants varying in race/ethnicity, body mass, height, age, and circumferences. When combined with contemporary statistical methods, these data sets can be used to create humanoid avatar images with pre-specified anthropometric features.
OBJECTIVE: The current study aimed to develop a humanoid avatar series with characteristics of representative US adults extending over the past six decades.
METHODS: 3D optical scans were conducted on a demographically diverse sample of 570 healthy adults. Image data was converted to principal components and manifold regression equations were then developed with body mass, height, age, and waist circumference as covariates. Humanoid avatars were generated for representative adults with these four characteristics as reported in Center for Disease Control surveys beginning in 1960-62 up to 2015-18.
RESULTS: There was a curvilinear increase in adult US population body mass, waist circumference, and body mass index (BMI) in males and females across the nine surveys spanning six decades. A small increase in average adult population age was present between 1960 and 2018; height changes were inconsistent. A series of four avatars developed at approximately 20-year intervals for representative males and females reveal the changes in body size and shape consistent with the emergence of the obesity epidemic. An additional series of developed avatars portray the shapes and sizes of males and females at key BMI cut points.
CONCLUSIONS: New mathematical approaches and accessible 3D optical technology combined with increasingly available large and diverse data sets across the lifespan now makes unique visualization of body size and shape possible on a previously unattainable scale. The study is registered at: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT03637855.
PMID:35030235 | DOI:10.1093/ajcn/nqac005
