RESEARCH ARTICLE Open Access Occupational Factors Associated with Changes in the Body Mass Index of Korean Male Manual Workers

Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Soonchunhyangshort-term versus long-term job experience when designinand Seong-Yong Cho* Objectives: This study was carried out to analyze and compare the occupational factors that could influence changes in body mass index (BMI) in male manual workers stratified into short-term and long-term work experience groups. Methods: The subjects were 299 male manual workers (sampled systematically) from 27 workplaces, who had undergone travelling medical examinations at a university hospital between March 28 and May 10, 2013, and had also undergone medical examinations at the same hospital in 2012. Their general and occupational characteristics were investigated through a structured, self-administered questionnaire. The BMI at each point in time was calculated based on the anthropometric results of the medical examinations. Multiple regression analyses were conducted on outcomes of the BMI change and predictors composed of the general and occupational characteristics, with the subjects stratified into groups with 5 years or less (short-term) versus more than 5 years (long-term) of work experience at the present post. Results: In the short-term work experience group, the BMI increases of 3-shift workers and groups reporting disagreement with feeling “insufficient job control ” and “lack of reward ” at work, two of the subscales of job stress