Summary of key findings

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Social class, gender, and time use: Implications for the social determinants of body weight?

While there is a consistent inverse association between socio-economic status and health, the same is not true for the association between socio-economic status and weight. The authors of this study explore this difference by looking at time use data from 1986 and 2005 based on gender and on income and education.

Differences by gender

Between 1986 and 2005 there was an increase in the average daily time men spent on household work, food preparation, care giving, voluntary activities and physically active leisure. Men’s average time decreased for school/education and reading. The time that men spent in paid work and commuting did not change substantially.

Over the same period, among women, average time increased for paid work, commuting and physically active leisure. Women’s average time decreased for food preparation and less physically active leisure.

Despite these changes over time, differences between the sexes persisted. In both 1986 and 2005, women were significantly less likely than men to spend time in paid work, commuting, eating out and television/computer use. They were more likely than men to spend time in household work, food preparation/meals at home, shopping/services, care giving, civic/voluntary activities, school/education, personal activities, sleep, socializing and less physically active leisure.

While women were not as likely as men to report physically active leisure in 1986, by 2005 the difference was not significant. And in 2005, women were more likely than men to spend time reading, a difference that was not observed in 1986.

Income and education

In both 1986 and 2005, with the effects of educational attainment taken into account, higher-income men were more likely than lower-income men to spend time in paid work, commuting, eating out and attending entertainment events, and less likely to spend time sleeping. This could help explain the positive association between income and BMI that has been observed in Canada.

Spending time watching television/using the computer was negatively associated with education in 1986 and with income in 2005. Physical activity was not associated with income or education for men in 1986, but was positively associated with education in 2005.

In 1986 and 2005, higher-income women were significantly more likely than lower-income women to spend time in paid work, commuting, eating out and personal activities, and less likely to spend time sleeping, doing household work, meals at home and socializing, with level of education taken into account. However, even though this time-use pattern is similar to that of men, there is no positive income-obesity association for women. This may be because of gender differences in desirable physical characteristics, and because women may be more concerned about appearance.

In both years, women’s odds of spending time care giving were positively associated with education and negatively associated with income. Women’s odds of spending time reading were positively associated with education (but not income) in 1986 and 2005. Their odds of watching television/using the computer were negatively associated with income in both 1986 and 2005, and with education in 2005. Spending time in physically active leisure was negatively associated with women’s income in 1986, but positively associated with their education in 2005.