Title: RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN BODY MASS INDEX AND BODY FAT IN CHINESE CHILDREN
Abstract: The purpose of this study was to establish the relationship between body mass index (BMI) and level of body fat in Chinese children aged 8 to 13 yrs. Body fat (%fat) of 141 children (75 boys and 66 girls) measured by hydrostatic weighing were used as criterion. Height and weight of children were measured using calibrated scale and BMI was computed using the measured height and weight. Children were then divided into validation (N = 70) and cross-validation (N = 71) groups. For the validation samples, high correlation was found between BMI and %fat (r = 0.81). Regression analysis found that the shared variance was 66% and standard error of estimate was 4.72%. When regression equation found from the validation sample was applied to the cross-validation sample, the correlation between the measured and predicted %fat was r = 0.75. The intercept and slope of the regression line between the measured and predicted %fat was found not different from zero and one (p>.05), respectively. It is concluded that BMI is a useful and practical measure of body composition, and produce satisfactory prediction of body fat for Chinese children. The suggested equation is %Fat = −17.669 + 2.026 (BMI).