Obesity among young people increases lifetime cardiovascular risk. This study assesses the prevalence of overweight/obesity and its associated factors among a random sample of university students from 22 universities in 22 low, middle income and emerging economy countries. This cross-sectional survey comprised of a self-administered questionnaire and collected anthropometric measurements. The study population was 6773 (43.2%) males and 8913 (56.8%) females, aged 16 to 30 years (mean 20.8 years, SD = 2.6). Body mass index (BMI) was used for weight status. Among men, the prevalence of underweight was 10.8%, normal weight 64.4%, overweight 18.9% and obesity 5.8%, while among women, the prevalence of underweight was 17.6%, normal weight 62.1%, overweight 14.1% and obesity 5.2%. Overall, 22% were overweight or obese (24.7% men and 19.3% women). In multivariate regression among men, younger age, coming from a higher income country, consciously avoiding fat and cholesterol, physically inactivity, current tobacco use and childhood physical abuse, and among women older age, coming from a higher income country, frequent organized religious activity, avoiding fat and cholesterol, posttraumatic stress symptoms and physical childhood abuse were associated overweight or obesity. Several gender specific risk factors identified can be utilized in health promotion programmes.

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Reply to reviewersReviewer #1 Comment 1: The aim of the study was to investigate the relationships between Problematic Internet Use (PIU) and time spent online, online activities and psychopathology, by taking cross-cultural and gender differences into account. Additionaly it was aimed to explore the prevalence of PIU among European Internet users according the 5593 responding internet users. The topic is timely and interesting.It is not clearly explained if problematic gaming, gambling and pornography are subdimensions of Problematic Internet Use (PIU) or different independent variables. Answer 1:We provided some additional information on page 1: "Therefore, PIU represents generalized PIU (Davis, 2001) and can include several specific uses, such as online gaming, gambling or pornography use (Laconi, Tricard, & Chabrol, 2015).".Comment 2: Which gap in the literature will be filled through this research, in other words what is the value added to the literature by this paper?Answer 2: We added additional information regarding this thanks to this comment, as follows: "Cross-cultural studies allow a better understanding of results given the use of the same methodology, timeline or statistical analysis. However, few cross-cultural studies have been performed on PIU, despite it being an international health issue. To our knowledge, only one cross-cultural study explored PIU among 989 adults of four European countries (Sariyska et al., 2014), the others being focused on adolescents, and none exclusively among European users. PIU has been the subject of many studies since the last decade, but there is a need for cross-cultural empirical research.". Comment 3: The possible reasons of the differences between countries based on the results of the study need to explained.Answer 3: More explanation has been provided in the discussion section and the second paragraph of this section begins by "Apart from the question of whether PIU as a phenomenon is on the increase, it is fascinating that comparing the countries we investigated, startling differences in the numbers of problematic users were found. Further research is *Response to Reviewers needed to determine whether a stable pattern emerges and what the reasons for these differences may be.".Besides, in the limitations section, we added: "Cultural background may be a weaker predictor of online behavior than age of onset for Internet use or participation in specific online communities. It can be argued that the Internet is facilitating the spread of new trends worldwide at a much faster rate than before, but also that it creates an international community in its own right, which is evident with the community of online gaming or social media.". Comment 4: The conclusion part is not satisfactory, also implications are missing. Answer 4:The conclusion has been modified. As all the reviewers suggested, an Implication section has been added.Comment 5 : Although the researchers tried to sample all ages, 2/3 of it is university students which can dominate the sample and may lead to ...

This study was carried out to determine the general characteristics of Internet use among university students in Turkey and to examine the relation between the Internet use and the psychosocial conditions of the students. Among the 730 university students who participated, the average age was 20.84 (SD=1.95), and the majority were females. The average Internet use period of the students was detected as 2.80 (SD=1.33) years for females and 3.59 (SD=1.60) years for males. The average score of the Online Cognition Scale (OCS) used for determining problematic use was 84.64 (SD=33.50): for females, 77.99 (SD=30.70); for males, 92.16 (SD=34.96). Students of social sciences scored highest on the OCS. It was determined that as the OSC score increased, students' performance of Internet activities such as general information searches and academic research decreased and that performance of interactive and entertainment Internet activities such as chat, financial transactions, game playing, sex, downloading programs, and listening to MP3s increased. While a positive correlation was found between problematic use and loneliness and depression, a negative correlation was found between problematic use and perceived social support.