Effect of Obesity on Cognitive Function among School Adolescents: A Cross-Sectional Study

Childhood obesity contributes to the risk of numerous health problems and has become a major global health concern. This study aimed to establish the association between obesity and cognitive function among healthy school adolescents.

This study was carried out by taking school adolescents (n = 400) from June 2016 to December 2017. The mean age of the participants was 13.93 ± 0.81 years. The students were divided into group A (obese, n = 223) and B (non-obese, n = 177). Cognitive functions were recorded as per study tool of the Cambridge Neuropsychological Test Automated Battery (CANTAB).

Severely obese students showed a significant delay in cognitive functions as compared to students with normal BMI. Attention Switching Task (AST)-Latency among students with normal BMI was 647.88 ± 137.59 compared to the students with high BMI (685.08 ± 115.92, p = 0.05), AST-Incongruent was 680.78 ± 142.07 versus 726.76 ± 122.31 (p = 0.02), AST-Percent correct trials was 84.31 ± 10.45 versus 78.09 ± 14.87 (p = 0.001), and Intra-Extra Dimensional Set Shift (IED) Total errors among students with normal BMI was 33.93 ± 21.53 compared to the students with high BMI (42.86 ± 37.27, p = 0.03).

Cognitive functions including AST-Latency, AST-Incongruent, AST-Percent correct trials, and IED Total errors were significantly weakened in markedly obese students. Significant impairments in their cognitive functions, especially attention, retention, intelligence, and cognitive flexibility, were observed. The findings of this study emphasize the need to involve school adolescents in physical activities to reduce body weight in order to have cognitive functions within normal range and also to minimize obesity-associated complications.