Background: An unhealthy lifestyle among people is a serious and often unnoticed problem. Today however, as a standard of living continues to rise, weight gain & obesity are posing threat to health in countries all over the world. The present Study is effect of life style on body mass index in urban and rural student population in city.

Methods: The data were derived from cross-sectional sampling of 525 urban & rural students of age 17-25. Age, gender, height, weight, body mass index (BMI) & waist hip ratio were used to define overweight and obesity.

Results: Out of 525 students, 20 were found overweight according to BMI (3.80%) which is not significant but most of them were in urban group. Students who migrated from rural area to urban area (Neourban) have their BMI in between urban and rural students because of less impact of urbanization. Urban group has higher mean waist-hip ratio as compared to Neourban and Rural group. It correlates with increased prevalence of obesity in urban population.

Conclusion: Study concludes that there is close association between Lifestyle and BMI.This study showed an increasing in prevalence of overweight and obesity in urban adolescents especially with male gender, calling for an urgent need for immediate and targeted preventive measures.

Keywords: Adolescent, Body Mass Index (BMI), Overweight, Obesity.

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Yamini Ingale

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