Biosocial and nutritional effects on body composition in young adults from Wrocław, Poland

This work concerns the questions if and to what extent social variables past and present, and actual sports activity and nutritional and smoking habits, have an influence on body compartment indices, and how this differs between female and male medical students from Wrocław, Poland. Backward stepwise regression was applied to four dependent variables, i.e. Body Mass Index (BMI), %Fat Mass (%FM), Extracellular Water/Intracellular Water Index (100 x ECW/ICW) and Body Cell Mass Index (BCMI=BCM/height2), and for eighteen independent variables including nutrition, parents' social status, smoking and sports activity. Females ate meat less frequently and fruit and vegetables more often, and drank beer less frequently but milk more often than did male students. It seems that there exists some effect on fat accumulation resulting from difference in nutrition between females and males. The results may be interpreted in terms of a parental gender effect on body composition of children associated with different conditions of life and nutrition in childhood and youth for female and male students in Wrocław.