International Journal of Community Medicine and Public Health | February 2017 | Vol 4 | Issue 2 Page 554 International Journal of Community Medicine and Public Health Tomar SP et al. Int J Community Med Public Health. 2017 Feb;4(2):554-559 http://www.ijcmph.com pISSN 2394-6032 | eISSN 2394-6040 Original Research Article Study of life style determinants of overweight and obesity among school going adolescents in urban Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh, India Shashi Prabha Tomar*, Pradeep Kumar Kasar, Rajesh Tiwari INTRODUCTION Obesity has become a colossal epidemic causing serious public health concern and contributes to 2.6 million deaths worldwide every year. 1 Indian data regarding current trends in childhood obesity are emerging. A recent study conducted among 24,000 school children in south India showed that the proportion of overweight children increased from 4.94 per cent of the total students in 2003 to 6.57 per cent in 2005 demonstrating the time trend of this rapidly growing epidemic. 2 The proportion of school-age children affected will almost double by 2010 compared with the most recently available surveys from the late 1990s up to 2003. 3 Current evidence indicates that obesity is a multi-factorial condition influenced by many variables, including genetic, demographic and lifestyle factors. 4 Genetic and demographic variables such as family history of obesity, age, ethnicity and sex can not be modified. However, obesity-associated lifestyle factors are often modifiable. In fact, previous research has shown that childhood obesity is associated with many lifestyle factors, ABSTRACT Background: Obesity has become a colossal epidemic causing serious public health concern and contributes to 2.6 million deaths worldwide every year. Indian data regarding current trends in childhood obesity are emerging. Considering the fact that India has rapidly growing middle class easily habituated for enormous lifestyle changes in recent decades responsible for developing potential platform for obesity among youths. Accordingly, the objective of the present study was to evaluate the associations between overweight, obesity and several lifestyle factors, including physical activity, sedentary behaviours among adolescents aged 10-17 years. Methods: A cross-sectional study was carried out in two schools of Jabalpur located around medical college area , 184 students effectively interviewed by predesigned questionnaire regarding Socio-demographic profile ie current residence, age, mothers educational and occupational status and family size and life style practices like the physical activity questions designed to asses typical time spent per day on games and outdoor activity, on sedentary activities, including television (TV) viewing, video games, and computer and internet use. Data entry and data processing were carried out using the SPSS version 17 software and data analyses were applied using the appropriate statistical tests of significance. Results: Prevalence of obesity and overweight: Of the 184 adolescents studied, 7.6% were obese and 2.2% were pre- obese. Conclusions: Among all of the lifestyle factors assessed, overweight and obesity exhibited associations with less frequent physical activity, and more television and internet use. Keywords: Adolescents, Life style, Obesity, Overweight Department of Community Medicine, NSCBMC, Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh, India Received: 15 October 2016 Revised: 11 December 2016 Accepted: 20 December 2016 *Correspondence: Dr. Shashi Prabha Tomar, E-mail: tomarshashi9@gmail.com Copyright: © the author(s), publisher and licensee Medip Academy. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License, which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.18203/2394-6040.ijcmph20170290