ABSTRACT
Introduction: Different patterns of activities were reported due to different cultural attitudes of the individuals. Socio-economic status should be taken into consideration when exploring the effect of socio-economic status on health over the life course. Available literature brings out limited studies on socio-economic status and its association with physical activity. In view of above, present study was undertaken to determine an association between selected demographic variables, BMI and physical activity, among older adults, in south India. Materials and Methods: Present study is a community based cross-sectional study, undertaken among older adults (> 55 years and above). Purposive sampling method was used to select the study subjects. A total of 63 older adults were included in the study. The study was conducted over a period of one and half years from 01 January 2018 to 30 June 2019, in selected urban and semi-urban areas in Dakshina Kannada district, Karnataka (India). Results: The study comprised of a total of 63 older adults which included 32 (50.79%) males while remaining 31(49.20%) were females. The physical activity levels were found to be highest (33.33%) in 55-60 years age group while these were lowest (0.00%) in 75 years and above, age group. The association between physical activity and age, was found to be statistically significant. (p value= 0.015) Discussion: In our study, out of 21 older adults from middle SES class 13 (61.90%) were found to be having low physical activity, while in lower SES group out of 21 subjects 9 (42.85%) were found to be having high physical activity levels. However, the subjects from upper SES group, revealed low levels of physical activity as only 02(09.52%) out of 21 subjects showed high levels of physical activity. Conclusion: Present study brings out significant association between physical activity and BMI, while no association was observed between socio-economic status and physical activity. Further, low levels of physical activity were observed across all SES groups,