1.1 Data collection

It’s impossible, practically, to gather the whole US adult population and measure their height. I’ve therefore collected a sample of data:

  • In an online survey, I asked 150 citizens to report their height. Self-reports may come with a host of problems (for example, people may not accurately know their true height, people may make a mistake when entering their height, etc), but let’s assume they somewhat accurately reflect people’s true height.
  • I’ve also asked the respondents to report their weight, social media use, body satisfaction, perception of the primary cause of obesity (not exercising enough / eating too much), and their socio-economic status.

I have all these data for a UK sample of 141 citizens as well. For now, however, let’s focus on height in the US sample.