[The role of risk propensity in smokers and overweight people]

The aim of this study is to investigate the nature of the link associating the risk propensity of smoking and overweight. For example, a person who is a smoker and obese does not have to be more prone to risk than another person who is obese and a non-smoker.

The data was taken from the German Questionnaire on Personality and Daily (Cross section for the period 2005). This questionnaire was selected because it collects individual data on the sociodemographic characteristic, behaviours, risk attitudes, lottery games, and health status. Our main contribution is to analyse the role of risk propensity taking into account smoking and overweight.

Risk propensity encourages smoking, and to smoke and be overweight are positively associated. When the role of the unobserved characteristics are greater, the lower is the correlation between smoking and overweight. Although the risk propensity is an important determining factor of individual behaviour (smoking and overweight), its inclusion does not decrease the influence of personal circumstances and conditions. The need to define other measurements to be able to analyse the risk propensity of risk specific to risk behaviour is also highlighted.

To reduce the number of smokers would require interventions in life styles. Given that overweight is an important determining factor in the decision to smoke, to encourage healthy behaviours, such as physical exercise or balanced diets, could improve the health status of the population on reducing obesity rates, and consequently the number of smokers.