Association of Obesity with Depressive Symptomatology, Eating Habits, Interleukin-8 and Cortisol in a Young Population

ABSTRACT

Obesity is the result of a complex combination of psychological, biological, and environmental factors. In this work, we evaluate whether obesity is related to eating habits, depressive symptomatology, as well as interleukin-8 and cortisol. A descriptive cross-sectional study was carried out in 232 university students. All youths were surveyed to determine their eating habits and depressive symptomatology. Anthropometric measures and a blood sample were taken to determine its biochemical profile and its concentration of interleukin-8 and cortisol. The results show that interleukin-8 increase in the overfat group. The altered eating behaviors were frequent in the studied group; they were associated with the presence of obesity and the variation of interleukin-8 and cortisol. Besides, we found correlations of interleukin-8 with age, glucose, and lipid profile in the overfat group. In conclusion, these results indicate that high adiposity is related to changes in the concentrations of interleukin-8 and eating habits, confirming that obesity is the consequence of a complex network of various factors.

KEYWORDS:

• Obesity
• interleukin-8
• cortisol
• eating behaviors

Acknowledgments

We are grateful to Ángel Pérez Reyes for its technical assistance.

Disclosure statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Additional information

Funding

This research was funded by SEP-PROMEP (UDG-CA-805 and UDG-PTC-1149) and UDG-PROSNI to J.M.G-F, S.R-D, and E.I.L-P.