Abstract:The present study was undertaken in Bhubaneswar city of Odisha to assess the degree of association of bodily factors like age, height, weight, mid arm circumference, chest circumference, waist circumference, thigh circumference, waist-hip ratio (W/H) with Body Mass Index (BMI). The sample size was 120 out of which 60 boys and 60 girls were selected purposively. The subjects were teenagers between 13 to 18 years. They were grouped into early teenagers (13-15 years) and late teenagers (16-18years).
It was observed that age, mid arm, chest, waist, hip and thigh are showing significant positive correlation among themselves, whereas height of the respondents exhibited significant negative correlation with age, weight, mid arm, chest, waist, hip, thigh except waist/hip ratio. It was revealed through path analysis that body weight had the highest direct positive effect (0.955) on BMI in both boys and girls group. Age, mid arm, chest, waist, and hip and thigh attribution had indirect contribution towards BMI via body weight. The residual effect (0.158) indicated that the most of the important attributes included had major contribution for BMI.