Abstract / Summary
Background: Obesity in older adults is a major public health concern associated with chronic disease and reduced healthy life expectancy. This study examined the associations between habitual meal regularity and general and abdominal obesity among Korean older adults using Andersen’s Behavioral Model. Methods: Data from 3559 adults aged ≥65 years who participated in the eighth Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (2019–2021) were analyzed. Dietary behaviors included regular breakfast, lunch, and dinner consumption and the number of meal types regularly consumed. General obesity was defined as body mass index ≥ 25 kg/m2, and abdominal obesity as waist circumference ≥ 90 cm in men and ≥85 cm in women. Complex-sample hierarchical logistic regression analyses were conducted after adjusting for predisposing, enabling, and need factors. Results: Participants who regularly consumed all three meal types had lower body mass index and lower prevalence of general and abdominal obesity. In fully adjusted models, regular breakfast (adjusted odds ratio [aOR] = 0.64), dinner consumption (aOR = 0.51), and regular consumption of all three meal types (aOR = 0.61) were associated with lower odds of general obesity. Regular lunch consumption (aOR = 0.74) showed a nominally significant association with general obesity, but this association did not remain significant after the post hoc false discovery rate adjustment. Regular lunch consumption (aOR = 0.67) and regular consumption of all three meal types (aOR = 0.66) were also associated with lower odds of abdominal obesity. Conclusions: Regular meal consumption, particularly regular consumption of all three meal types, was associated with lower odds of general and abdominal obesity among Korean older adults. Meal regularity warrants further evaluation as a potential target in longitudinal and intervention studies, although causal relationships cannot be inferred from this cross-sectional study.