A study of 104 adults aged 45-64 shows that only 15 percent among them were aware of their obesity whereas 73 percent of them felt that they were only overweight and not obese. This perception was because of a wrong idea about BMI and as pointed out by John Cawley, a researcher at Cornell University who has studied body image:
BMI does not take into account body composition - weightlifters and other athletes may be classified as clinically obese because their weight is high even though they have almost no fat.
In other words even if body is composed only of muscles the weight of the muscles makes a person overweight and the perception of this fact about BMI is important to understand the cause of heart disease, diabetes and other disease that start with being overweight and end-up at obesity
