The prevalence of obesity is increasing in both developed and developing country. Overweight or obesity in adolescent is related to a poor body figure perception, low self-esteem, and a low level of confidence in physical abilities. The objective of the study was to find out the influence of body mass index (BMI) on self-esteem among adolescents and also find out the relationship between BMI, self esteem and socio-demographic characteristics of the respondents. This cross-sectional study was conducted among the students of Blue Bird School and College, a private school and college situated in Sylhet City, Bangladesh. Data was collected from students of class 9 and 10 and total of 158 students were included in the study. Data was collected by face to-face interview using a semi-structured questionnaire by author himself. After height and weight measurement, BMI was calculated as' weight in kilogram divided by the square of height in meter (kg/m²)’. Self-esteem was measured by using the Rosenberg Self-esteem Scale. Among 158 respondents, 52.5% were male and female were 47.5%. The mean age was 15.38 ± .754 years. Overweight and obesity were present in 31.6% of the respondents. Overweight and obesity was higher among the respondents whose mothers had a higher academic degree, which was statistically significant. According to the Rosenberg self-esteem scale, low self-esteem and normal self-esteem were present in 80.4% and 19.6% of the respondents, respectively. There was no significant relationship between self-esteem with socio-demographic data, but there was a statistically non-significant positive correlation between self-esteem and BMI on the Pearson Correlation test. Over-weight and obesity were found higher among the adolescents in this study. The proportion of self-esteem scores was low among the adolescents and self-esteem was positively related to high BMI.

Key word: Obesity, Body mass index, Self-esteem, Adolescent