Relationship Among Vision Status, Body Mass Index, and Employment

Abstract

Measures of visual status (normal sight, blindness), weight classification (normal weight, overweight, obesity), employment status (employed, unemployed) were obtained in 135 male and female adults. Results indicated that weight category was not associated with employment status and the number of employment interviews was unrelated to vision status and weight for both unemployed and employed participants after excluding data from three blind persons who reported an excessive number of job interviews. In addition, weight classification was not a significant predictor of employment status for blind or sighted adults and persons with blindness were three times more likely to be unemployed than self-employed and four times more likely to be unemployed than employed by an organization compared to normally-sighted individuals. These findings highlight the need to develop targeted strategies to reduce employment-based discrimination among adults with visual impairment.