The relationship of meal habits and alcohol/ cigarette consumption to circadian typology and sleep health in Japanese female students was studied from an epidemiological point of view. Questionnaires on Morningness-Eveningness by Torsvall and Åkerstedt (1980), sleep habits, regularity of meal intake and meal amount, and style of alcohol and cigarette consumption were administered to 800 students aged 18-29 years, attending university or training schools for nutrition specialists (Aichi Prefecture, 35°N). Points from ten questions were totaled to provide estimates of sleep habits given as the Unhealthy Sleep Index (UHSI). The average and standard deviation of Morningness-Eveningness scores were 16.07Ϯ3.53. Students who had breakfast at regular times showed significantly higher Morningness-Eveningness scores than those who ate at irregular times. Based on an integrated analysis (ANOVA) on the effect of regularity of breakfast intake on sleep health, regular breakfast intake may link to sleep health positively via the shifting to morning-type (i.e., the phase-advance of the circadian clock). However, a similar analysis promoted the hypothesis that alcohol consumption and cigarette smoking relate to sleep health negatively and directly, rather than via the shifting to evening-type (i.e., the phase-delaying of the circadian clock). In the case of young women, getting a good quality and quantity of sleep in normal life seems to be important for promoting their mental health, which may fluctuate throughout the menstruation cycle accompanied by mental symptoms as a part of premenstrual syndrome.

and Sciences Objective: Gender differences in the usage of supplements by working adults and their awareness of them. Methods: Full-time employees of Company A in the Tokai region of Japan and their spouses were given cross-sectional questionnaires (response rate: 61.3%), and 658 responses from full-time employees and their spouses were analyzed. Results: Supplements were used by 23.7% of the participants. They were used by significantly more women than men, and women also had a greater tendency to seek advice regarding supplement use (advice sought by: women, 44.9%; men, 24.1%; p=0.01). Advice was only rarely sought from professionals. The greatest number of respondents stated that they were unsure whether they were satisfied with their supplement use. Conclusions: Few participants sought out professional advice when taking supplements and many participants appeared to continue using supplements without noticing any improvement. This suggests both the need for further training of professionals to give more appropriate advice regarding necessary supplement use as well as the need to encourage education aimed at creating eating behavior that does not rely simply on supplements.

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