A methodological critique of the 'ideal weight' concept
T. R. Knapp
This article raises several objections to the procedures that were employed
to determine ideal (optimal, desirable) weights in the 1959 and 1979 Build
and Blood Pressure studies, the Framingham (Mass) study, and the recent
study of the relationship between weight and mortality carried out by the
American Cancer Society. The new height-weight tables based on the 1979
Build and Blood Pressure study are also criticized. The article concludes
with the recommendation that the concept of ideal weight be abandoned and
that attention be devoted to the morbidity and mortality experience of
"outliers" (the very thin and the very obese).
