Anthropometric assessment and school achievement in school-age children from high school in Valparaiso, Chile

The purpose of this study was to determine the interrelationship between nutritional status and scholastic achievement (SA). The total population included 1,488 high school students from Valparaíso, City, V Region of Chile. A representative sample of 165 school-age children was chosen from public schools in which the Improvement Education Quality Program (MECE) from the Ministry of Education of Chile was tried. Socioeconomic status (SES) was measured by means of the Graffar's modified method. Nutritional status was assessed through anthropometric measurements of weight (W), height (T), head circumference (HC), arm circumference (AC) and triceps skindfold (TS). SA was determined by a language (SAL) and mathematics (SAM) test. Statistical analysis included analysis of variance, correlation multiple regression and chi-square. Results showed that HC is the anthropometric parameter with the greatest explanatory power in SA variance, in high school graduates (r2 = 0.7697), both SAL (r2 = 0.9258) and SAM (r2 = 0.5268), with a RR = 1.97. In this respect, 75% of school children with Z-HC values below median obtained a low percentage of achievement in the SA test. Considering that HC is a direct indicator of nutritional background and indirect indicator of brain development, these findings increase the knowledge in this area and reveal the need to carry out further research related to the interrelationship SA-brain development.