Eating habits and obesity among Lebanese university students

Abstract

BackgroundIn the past year Lebanon has been experiencing a nutritional transition in food choices from the typical Mediterranean diet to the fast food pattern. As a consequence, the dietary habits of young adults have been affected; thus, overweight and obesity are increasingly being observed among the young. The purpose of this study is to assess the prevalence of overweight and obesity on a sample of students from the Lebanese American University (in Beirut) and to examine their eating habits.MethodsA cross-sectional survey of 220 students (43.6% male and 56.4% female), aged 20 ± 1.9 years, were chosen randomly from the Lebanese American University (LAU) campus during the fall 2006 semester. Students were asked to fill out a self-reported questionnaire that included questions on their eating, drinking and smoking habits. Also, their weight, height, percentage body fat and body mass index were measured. Body mass index (BMI) was used to assess students' weight status. Statistical analyses were performed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences software (version 13.0) to determine overweight and obesity among students and to categorize eating habits.ResultsThis study showed that the majority of the students (64.7%) were of normal weight (49% male students compared to 76.8% female students). The prevalence of overweight and obesity was more common among male students compared to females (37.5% and 12.5% vs. 13.6% and 3.2%, respectively). In contrast, 6.4% female students were underweight as compared to 1% males. Eating habits of the students showed that the majority (61.4%) reported taking meals regularly. Female students showed healthier eating habits compared to male students in terms of daily breakfast intake and meal frequency. 53.3% of female students reported eating breakfast daily or three to four times per week compared to 52.1% of male students. There was a significant gender difference in the frequency of meal intake (P = 0.001). Intake of colored vegetables and fruits was common among students. A total of 30.5% reported daily intake of colored vegetables with no gender differences (31.5% females vs. 29.2% males). Alcohol intake and smoking were not common among students.ConclusionIn spite of the overall low prevalence of overweight and obesity in the studied sample, results indicate that university students would possibly benefit from a nutrition and health promotion program to reduce the tendency of overweight and obesity, especially among male students, and to im...

Development of Web- Based Nutritional Health Education Module

“…Overweight and obesity were observed among 34.3% and 7.4% of the studied university students respectively. These findings were similar to a study that was conducted in Lebanon by by Yahia et al, 2008 (36) . Overweight and obesity were higher in female than male, this finding consistent with other study of (37) .…”

Association between stress and dietary behaviors among university students: Mini-review

“…Similarly, two other studies both reported that when distressed, their female study participants appeared to lose control of their eating habits which resulted in their consumption the unhealthy foods that they would usually avoid for health or weight motives [6,20]. One explanation for the gender difference in food selection patterns during stress may be the tendency of females to restrict their diet for weight control when not stressed [21,22] The cake and chocolate biscuits preferred here by stressed emotional eaters are typically eaten as snacks. There is evidence that snack consumption may be more susceptible to stress than meals [23,24].…”

The Relation between body image satisfaction, self-esteem and the academic behavior among the first and fourth year students in the faculty of nursing Tanta University

“…[29] In addition, Yahia N et al stated that male students were less worried about their body image compared to females. [30] Also Coelho EM in 2016 mentioned that more girls (50.2%) than boys (39.8%) had a thin body, while more boys wished to be larger (15.8% vs. 10.6%). [31] There was a significant relationship between dissatisfaction with body image and the students' residence as rural first year students had low body image dissatisfaction than the urban ones.…”