Abstract

Researchers into subjects such as obesity, anorexia nervosa, and body shape are currently hampered by the lack of any generally accepted expression for people whose body mass index (BMI) is within the optimal range. Those with excessive BMI are termed fat or obese, those with too low a BMI are called thin—but there is no word for those whose BMI lies between the undesirable extremes. We suggest that the word `slim' should be adopted to describe people of `optimal' BMI—those who are neither fat nor thin, and whose BMI is presumed to be near that which is the most healthy and attractive.