The relation between the BMI (level of nourishment) and the bad kyphotic posture of the elementary school students
This paper is aimed at establishing the Body Mass Index (BMI), on the population of elementary school students aged 11 ± 6 months, and the level of correlation with bad kyphotic body posture. The survey was carried out on 428 respondents (219 male and 209 female), on the territory of the city of Kragujevac. In order to estimate the kyphotic bad body posture a somatometry method was used (the sinker, ruler and dermograph), and the level of nourishment was established by using Body Mass Index (BMI) which were compared with the table made in percentiles. The existence and the level of correlation between the researched spaces was made by using the Pearsonžs Chi square test and the contingency coefficient as a correlation measure based on the Chi square test. The greatest number of respondents have normal weight (75,58 %), followed by a much smaller number of those prone to gaining weight (11,29 %), whereas the num­ber of over-weight and undernourished respondents is very small (5,30 %; 6,45 %). The biggest number of cases of the kyphotic body posture was found in the group of over-weight students (60.87 %), followed by a group of students prone to gaining weight 48.98 % and 43.90 % have normal weight; lastly the number of undernourished students amount to 28.57 %. The kyphotic body posture of the male respondents is highest in the group of over-weight students (80%), followed by the undernourished respondents with 71.43%, then those prone to gaining weight with 66.67%, and lastly the respondents with normal weight with 56.91%. The female respondents show the biggest number of kyphotic body posture in the over-weight group too (46.15%), followed by the group of those prone to gaining weight with 35.71%, whereas the smallest number of bad body posture can be found in the group of under-nourished respondents (14.29%). The values of the Pearsonžs Chisquare and Conlingency coefficient, on the level of significance of 0.12, indicates that there is no statistically significant correlation of the kyphotic body posture and the BMI as the research on the population has shown. .