Table 1. Basic Characteristics for temporal sequence analyses.

Variable (unit)	Mean	SD	Skewness	Kurtosis	n
Waist (cm)
In 2001	84.1	12.3	0.74	3.59	2253
In 2007	88.6	13.5	0.71	3.78	2181
In 2011	91.9	14.2	0.72	3.98	2051
BMI (kg/m2)
In 2001	25.1	4.4	1.15	5.30	2276
In 2007	26.0	4.8	1.27	6.29	2170
In 2011	26.5	5.1	1.26	5.87	2049
TV time (h/day)
In 2001	1.9	1.2	1.05	6.01	2594
In 2007	1.8	1.1	1.40	8.47	2224
In 2011	1.9	1.2	2.02	15.45	1970

All skewnesses and kurtoses are statistically significantly different from those of the Normal distribution (skewness  = 0, kurtosis  = 3), at the 0.001 significance level, and therefore non-Gaussian as required by the pairwise causality estimates.

Waist  =  Waist circumference.

BMI =  Body mass index.

SD =  Standard deviation.

n =  All available observations for the variable in question.