Evaluation of obesity and overweight in children aymaras of the province of Arica, Chile

In recent years there has been an increase in childhood obesity worldwide. Chile has not been oblivious to this problem, considered among the countries with higher incidence. Arica, an extreme region of Chile, borders Bolivia and Peru, has a great ethnic diversity predominating Aymara. The inhabitants of Arica have experienced adaptations to urban lifestyles, carrying out modifications corporal. For this motive is necessary to evaluate the body composition and the somatotype in Aymara children of the Arica commune. A non-experimental, descriptive, cross-sectional study was carried out under a quantitative exploratory analysis of variables evaluating 170 Aymara children between 8 and 10 years of age. The main results classify children as overweight, showing a meso-endomorphic somatotype and endo-mesomorphic girls, with a greater tendency to obesity in girls than in boys.