A review of the relationship between poverty, uninsured children, Essay

A review of the relationship between poverty, uninsured children, childhood obesity and the well-being index - Essay Example The current study aims to look at obesity and chronic obesity causing conditions since these are emerging as major reasons for negatively affecting the well being of people. Data for the study has been acquired from Gallup-Healthway’s Well Being Index  ® website from a survey conducted and compiled in 2009. Data was also acquired from the State Health Facts website for targeted states only. The data acquired from Gallup-Healthway was used to demarcate five states that formed the upper most and lowest tiers of obesity prevalence in the United States. The states of West Virginia, Mississippi and Kentucky exhibit the highest obesity rates while the states of Hawaii and Colorado displayed the lowest obesity rates (Mendes & McGeeney, 2012). The states were chosen in this order also because West Virginia, Mississippi and Kentucky are on the lowest rung of the WBI while Colorado and Hawaii are near the top of the WBI list. In addition to these statistics, three other variables were also used that include the population in poverty, the amount of uninsured kids and the amount of obese kids. Statistical Analysis Descriptive statistics were tabulated for the acquired data (shown in Appendix A). Gallup uses defined metrics in order to survey well being which can be listed as the Composite, Life Evaluation Index (LEI), Emotional Health Index (EHI), Work Environment Index (WEI), Physical Health Index (PHI), Healthy Behavior Index (HBI) and Basic Access Index (BAI) (Gallup-Healthways, 2009). The other variables used include the Population in Poverty (POP IN POV), uninsured kids and obese kids (State Health Facts, 2012). Results for the descriptive statistics are presented in the table shown below. Table 1 Descriptive Statistics WBI (Rank) State Health Fact (%) Descriptive Statistics for WBI and State Health Facts for the Nation Overall and the Five States Selected Descriptive Statistic COMPOSITE LEI EHI WEI PHI HBI BAI POP IN POV UNINSURED KIDS OBESE KIDS Mean 65.03 44.73 78.2 48.82 75.33 62.27 80.78 23.5 7.83 34.05 Median 64.95 44.55 78.5 48.9 75.7 62.15 81.1 23.5 8.5 33.55 Range 9.7 15.9 8.5 8.3 9.5 10.1 7.1 12 9 17.2 Standard Deviation 3.51 5.83 2.93 2.67 3.66 3.88 2.89 4.04 3.31 6.36 Standard Error 1.43 2.38 1.2 1.09 1.5 1.58 1.18 1.65 1.35 2.6 The mean and median for the Gallup data remain fairly close to each other for all reported metrics. In contrast, the data acquired from State Health shows some skewness for uninsured kids with the mean being 7.83 while the median is 8.5. The range for most variables being analyzed stays under 10 except for LEI (15.9), population in poverty (12) and obese kids (17.2). these variables could be expected to display larger standard deviations as well since the range of data is greater. In terms of the standard deviation, the highest value is displayed by obese kids (6.36) followed by LEI (5.83) while other variables display standard deviations of around 4. The standard error tabulation reveals similar res ults with LEI exhibiting a standard error of 2.38 and obese kids displaying a standard error of 2.6. In contrast, the standard error for population in poverty is 1.65 while other variables display standard errors of less than 1.6. Based on these results it could be safely assumed that the data acquired displays a near uniform distribution except for LEI and obese kids that tend to exhibit some skewness. Composite and domain scores by state as well as the