Typically, the most commonly used measure of body fatness has been body weight. This is then compared with a table of ‘ideal weights’ prepared by life insurance companies on the basis of actuarial data, relating weight to the risk of an early death or to average weights in the population, and some measure of overweight calculated on the basis of population figures.
As should be obvious from this cursory observation, there is no perfect measure of body fatness, or body fat distribution. Each easily usable measures have its advantages and disadvantages and these need to be considered carefully according to the situation. Some measures, e.g. BMI, WHR and ADI, might be combined in the practical situation and others would be left to more technical research procedures. For example, measure conicity (C-index) has its advantages and disadvantages. Advantages: adds height to fat distribution measure, simple, non invasive, cheap. Disadvantages: its calculation problems, lack of uniform norms for risk.
Accessible new machine measures have improved the level of sophistication of measurement but the degree of imperfection which remains in all current’ measures suggests there is an art to body fat measurement that is still required to accompany the science.
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