Department of Economics and Legal Studies, University of Naples "Parthenope", Via Generale Parisi, 13 80132 Napoli, Italy.
Department of Economics, Engineering, Society and Business Organization, University of Tuscia, Via del Paradiso, 37 01100 Viterbo, Italy.
Appetite. 2018 Apr 1;123:357-366. doi: 10.1016/j.appet.2018.01.004. Epub 2018 Jan 9.
Dietary patterns play key roles in health promotion and in preserving the environment. A growing number of studies show the importance of individual factors on food consumption choices, such as socio-economic status, lifestyle variables and contextual and social factors that characterize the geographical area in which individuals reside. The Mediterranean Diet is a sustainable diet that respects the environment, thus reducing per capita emissions from food production in respect to less sustainable diet. The aim of this paper is to determine the Italians' prevailing food patterns using a composite indicator and to identify which factors determine a higher adherence to the Mediterranean Diet in Italy. By using 15 waves of the ISTAT "Aspect of Daily Life" survey, we constructed an original data set and referred to the multilevel approach which enabled us to distinguish between temporal and cross-sectional effects thus providing valuable insights to policy makers and stakeholders in order to promote the Mediterranean Diet and reap environmental and public health. The results show that education plays an important role in determining food consumption behavior while the tendency to practice sports on a regular basis and to have breakfast and lunch at home positively influence people's adherence to this diet.
饮食模式在促进健康和保护环境方面起着关键作用。越来越多的研究表明，个人因素对食物消费选择很重要，如社会经济地位、生活方式变量以及个人所在地区的环境和社会因素。地中海饮食是一种可持续的饮食方式，尊重环境，因此减少了人均食物生产排放量，与不太可持续的饮食方式相比。本文的目的是使用综合指标来确定意大利人普遍的饮食模式，并确定哪些因素决定了意大利人对地中海饮食的更高依从性。通过使用 ISTAT（意大利国家统计局）“日常生活方面”调查的 15 个波次，我们构建了一个原始数据集，并采用了多层次方法，这使我们能够区分时间和横断面效应，从而为政策制定者和利益相关者提供有价值的见解，以促进地中海饮食，同时获得环境和公共健康效益。研究结果表明，教育在决定食物消费行为方面起着重要作用，而定期进行体育锻炼的倾向以及在家吃早餐和午餐的习惯会积极影响人们对这种饮食的依从性。
