Sedentary Behavior and Prevalence of Obesity among Nepalese Middle Aged Adults

Sedentary behaviour and obesity is a major risk factor of non-communicable diseases among adult population. A descriptive cross-sectional research design was used to identify the sedentary behaviour and prevalence of obesity among Nepalese middle aged adults. Nonprobability purposive sampling technique was used for the selection of 72 middle aged adults of Ward No. 25 of Kathmandu Metropolitan City, Nepal. Data collection was done from 18th to 30th September of 2016 by using structured interview schedule. Obtained data were edited, coded, classified manually and data entry and analysis were done using SPSS software version 16. Descriptive statistics and inferential statistics namely Chi square test were used to analyze the association between variables and the findings were presented on the relevant tables. The findings of this study revealed that the respondents have low (23.6%), average (37.5%) and high (38.9%) sedentary behavior. Moreover, this study also revealed that 38.9 percent of respondents had normal weight, 47.2 percent of them were overweight and least of them (13.9%) were obese. Moreover, there is a significant association between sedentary behaviour and obesity and there is no association of age group, gender, ethnicity, educational status and type of occupation with overweight and obesity as well as with sedentary behavior. Based on the findings of this study, it is concluded that more than one third of middle aged adults have nearly equally average and high sedentary behaviour. Sedentary behavior of middle aged adults is associated with overweight and obesity. Therefore, it is recommended that the authority of Kathmandu Metropolitan City should conduct awareness programme regarding consequences of sedentary behaviour and obesity for the prevention of chronic non-communicable disease.