BMI and the perception of the importance given to sexuality in obese and overweight people

Literature has been pointing towards obesity as the moderating variable of a depressive vicious cycle of self-esteem and self-image, with sócia] isolation, anxiety and depression. This in turn drives people to channel sexual pleasure into the pleasure of food, thus aggravating their condition of obesity even more and consequently causing a major negative impact on the individual's sexual life. Ojective: To assess the importance given to sexuality in obese and overweight individuals as well as assessing the existence of a correlation between these variables. Methods A quantitative exploratory study was conducted on 218 patients of both genders (68.3 % female and 31.7 % male) aged between 18 and 65. Data collection was carried out in several hospitais in the centre and north of the country. The data was collected by using the Index of Sexual Satisfaction (ISS). Results Among participants, 82.2 % were obese or overweight. Among the obese, 38.1 % registered a type l obesity; 16.4 % had type II obesity (severe); and 8.7 % had type III obesity (morbid). The obese revealed to be the ones who gave the most importance to sexuality, despite also being the ones who present the highest sexual dissatisfaction. Finally, the results show that there is a positive correlation, though weak, between sexual dissatisfaction and BMI. Conclusions Obese individuais are the ones who revealed the highest sexual dissatisfaction. Therefore, the cause of such dissatisfaction must be sought and valued as an issue related to obesity.