Extended Data Figure 6. Activity inequality is a better predictor of obesity than the the average activity level.

(a) Obesity is significantly correlated with the average number of daily steps in each country (LOESS fit; R² = 0.47). (b) However, activity inequality is the better predictor of obesity (LOESS fit; R² = 0.64). The difference is significant according to Steiger’s Z-Test (p < 0.01; Methods). This shows that there is value to measuring and modeling physical activity across countries beyond average activity levels. Activity inequality captures the variance of the distribution; that is, how many activity rich and activity poor people there are, allowing for better prediction of obesity levels. Figure repeated from Fig. 2a for comparison.