Income and education levels are not always the most important factors influencing adolescent obesity, but gender and ethnic-racial factors also play a major role, according to University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill researchers reporting in the journal Obesity Research.

The researchers analyzed data from 13,113 American adolescents enrolled in the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health in an effort to determine why obesity is higher in minority groups.

Using statistical techniques that mathematically equalized income and education among all the adolescents in the study, they found that at higher income levels, obesity rates were low for white, Hispanic and Asian girls but high for African-Ameriicans -- with the difference between white and black girls highest at the highest income and educational levels.

The researchers concluded that obesity is not just a reflection of socioeconomic differences, but that environmental, cultural, contextual and community factors also play a role in teen obesity.

Other sources: Obesity Research