Indian Journal of Public Health Research DOI& Development, Number: 10.37506/v11/i1/2020/ijphrd/194111 January 2020, Vol. 11, No. 01 1797 Obesity and Job Performance among Teachers in Malaysia Mohd Hakiki Md Tohid1, Zulkifli Khair2 1Master of Human Resource Development, 2Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, University Technology Malaysia Abstract Despite the growing interest of teacher performance in relation to factors such as leadership, work and/ or family conflict or stress, studies which linked teacher with overweight or obesity with job performance and productivity are insignificant. Moreover, Malaysia is Southeast Asia’s “most obese” nation with an obesity incidence of 17.7% and an overweight of 30%. Data is a review of newspapers and official reports as well as academic journal articles and theses from established databases such as Wiley Online Library, Taylor and Francis, ScienceDirect and ProQuest. The scope is obesity or overweight experiences which may affect performance or productivity at workplace taken from 2010 onwards including the level of non- communicable disease, productivity assessments and annual reports. Study about obesity and its impact towards teacher’s performance or productivity is almost none. The impact of obesity on job performance can be seen from its impact on individual, social and economy. The impact towards economy and individuals are discussed with focusing more on Malaysian context. Evidence used in this study come solely from the mentioned resources. Conclusions reached are thus qualified by that limitation. Further studies should be conducted on the exact obesity trends among teachers and the impacts on performance or productivity. More in-depth studies are needed specifically on the definite and diversified factors and the effective ways to tackle this issue among adult especially teachers. Keywords: Obesity, overweight, job performance, productivity, teacher. Introduction National Health and Morbidity Surveys (NHMS) findings from 1996-2015 in Malaysia show noticeable Study which relate obesity and job performance increases of average BMI and WC among Malaysian among teachers are still new especially in Malaysia. adults and children3. All ethnic groups displayed an Overweight and obesity, usually measured using upward trends of obesity with obese Indians (43.5 %), Body Mass Index (BMI) are defined by World married adults (33.8 %) and those with only secondary Health Organisation (WHO) as unusual or excessive education (32.1 %). The most significant increases in accumulation of fat posing a health threat1. Another average BMI and AO were observed in women and indicator used is abdominal obesity (AO) measured in people in the rural population3. The highest gain in the waist circumference (WC) which appears to be more overweight incidence was also seen in males and the closely related to a high morbidity and death, as well elderly4,5. as an increase in the risk of cardiovascular (CVD) and diabetes mellitus compared to BMI2. For job performance, there are studies about the level and its association with some determining factors Corresponding Author: like leadership style, motivation, job stress, emotional Mohd Hakiki Md Tohid intelligence, workforce diversity, work environment, Master of Human Resource Development, Faculty of teacher characteristics, personality traits and work 6,7,8,9,10,11 Social Sciences and Humanities, University Technology passion . Teacher plays a major role as the Malaysia, 81310 Skudai, Johor, Malaysia people who cultivate and educate the future generation of a nation by their great influence. Beside mothers, e-mail: [email protected] 1798 Indian Journal of Public Health Research & Development, January 2020, Vol. 11, No. 01 teacher’s BMI, education level as well as teacher’s and nearly one third work in the education services satisfaction with children’s weight have significant alone20. The total wage deployment for public service impact on children weight and health12. A study also people is around 11.4 % of the overall salary spending shows that teacher’s body image has influence the in Malaysia20. Although Malaysia’s Competitiveness children13. Thus, the performance of teachers is linked Ranking is getting lower, the number of teachers in to the growth of students14,15. This scenario is quite Malaysia’s education sector is increasing every year. It alarming as recent research shows 19.9% or one in five brings negative impact towards the education system and children ages 7-12 in Malaysia suffer from overweight some correction measures are needed to tackle the issue. and obesity16. Table 2 shows the total number of teachers in Malaysia from year 2014 until 2018. Level And Condition: The Malaysian job performance rating has declined considerably from Table 2: Total Number of Teacher in Malaysia 2015 to 2017, according to the Global Competitiveness Report (GCR) 2015-201817,18,19. As below, Table 1 Year Total Number of Teacher in Malaysia shows that Malaysia is currently placed at 25th position 2014 420854 out of 140 countries 19. In 2016, however, it was listed 2015 421379 18th 17. It shows that employee efficiency in Malaysia, 2016 421828 including teachers, has decreased. 2017 422505 2018 423566 Table 1: Malaysia’s Competitiveness Rankings The findings from NHMS 2015 indicate that the Year Performance Score Ranking government’s administrative officials had a 35-37% 2015 5.23 20th likelihood of overweight while obesity stood at 43%21. 2016 5.16 18th If by taking the same percentage of 43% for obesity 2017 5.17 26th rates, the prevalence of teachers who might be fallen 74.4 (new format: Global 2018 25th into the overweight and obese group are estimated Competitiveness Index 4.0) around 181000. The findings put the administration in a disgraceful state, since the number of Malaysia Malaysia currently has about 32 million people overweight and obese people were not reduced22. This and around 1,7 million are in public service which scenario is a clear signal that obesity crisis, which has made them the largest public service number in South already overwhelmed our health care services, will also East Asia. Of the groups, 39 % work in the General cripple our economy and the growth of the younger Federal Public Service, 14 % work in the health sector generations if no decisive action taken23. Impacts on Economy: Figure 1: Economic cost of obesity framework Indian Journal of Public Health Research & Development, January 2020, Vol. 11, No. 01 1799 Figure 1 above shows the cost of obesity from In Malaysia, Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs) an economic point of view. It can be divided into are estimated to account for 73 percent of total deaths two categories; direct and indirect. The Economist with 35 percent of these deaths occurring in those Intelligence Unit24 reports that direct costs are associated people under 60 years39. Premature mortality occurs in with medical expenditure from diagnosis, therapy and 4 major groups of NCDs such as cardiovascular disease, also from prevention on obesity associated illnesses. In cancers, diabetes, and chronic respiratory diseases. The Malaysia, Total Expenditure on Health (TEH) in year probability of dying between ages 30 and 70 years from 2013 has been recorded as RM 44.748 million, which is these 4 main NCDs is 20 percent39. equal to 4.53% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP)25. The TEH is increasing each year, with RM 53.110 million Impacts on Individuals: registered in 2015 and RM 57.361 million registered in 201725. Despite health expenditure is being highly subsidized, the spending remained largely expended on government and public needs26. Absenteeism is defined as time off from work because of obesity and overweight. Due to the ease of estimation, absenteeism was likely the most frequent indirect cost measurement. In Malaysia, the Malaysian Employers Federation (MEF) Medical Benefits & Man- Figure 2: Cost of obesity on individuals Days Loss (Including Absenteeism) Survey 2015 has projected that for 6.6 million workforce, companies Individuals have greater likelihood of unemployment need to pay out RM1.18billion in medical costs for and are likely to receive lower salaries as a result of 40 hospitalized employees and RM46.3million in non- obesity . Loss of productivity due to work injury and hospitalization medical costs27. longer recovery time will make them unpreferable worker. In addition, demand for support services and Presenteeism at workplace or showing up for disability management is likely to increase because of work during sickness, now appears more common than obese conditions that limit their basic physical abilities41. absenteeism. It may constitute physical and mental When gender is taken into account, the impact of obesity absence28. Presenteeism is present in most fields, but on salary varies between man and woman, whereas the is particularly high in education29. Presenteeism is obese woman receives lower earnings than the non- frequently associated with severe losses in productivity obese counterparts42. On the contrary, their non-obese and has a number of symptoms such as migraines, counterparts are getting high pay customer related jobs allergies, sinus problems, asthma, acid reflux disease, which require attractive personalities like representatives dermatitis, anxiety and depression29. Many studies have of sales and customer relationships43. shown that presenteeism contributes to depersonalisation 44 and fatigue30. Study in Malaysia found that about 30% of the students agreed out of 93 obese participants that In terms of disability, the decreased executive the body weight limits their ability in every type of role was linked to obesity but not overweight in some work. Approximately 50% said their work was linked researches31,32. Further, it is shown that some facial to sedentary behavior and poor mobility. 63% of emotional decoding problems occur in overweight respondents believed they were treated differently and obese kids in comparison to normal weight kids33. because of their weight. Moreover, 73 of them felt that Low conscientiousness have also been associated with their supervisors should take account of their weight in higher BMI34.