Dietary Regimen, Overweight, and Obesity in Human Nutrition Students and Other Majors: A Cross-Sectional Study.

BACKGROUND

Choosing a healthy diet is an increasingly a challenge for university students. The objective of this study was to compare diet and overweight/obesity in human nutrition students (HNS) and students of other careers (SOC) from a university located in Lima, Peru.

METHODS

It was a cross-sectional study consisting of 158 students out of an initial sample of 170. Information was collected on the sociodemographic and anthropometric characteristics of the participants and a validated questionnaire was applied to evaluate the frequency of food consumption.

RESULTS

There was no significant difference in diet between HNS and SOC ( > 0.05). HNS most frequently consumed yellow/orange vegetables ( = 0.020), purple vegetables ( = 0.049), citrus fruits ( = 0.029), eggs ( = 0.002), whole milk ( = 0.013), yogurt ( = 0.017), tofu ( = 0.003), olive oil ( = 0.003), other vegetable oils ( < 0.001), and alcoholic beverages ( = 0.037) than SOC. In contrast, HNS had a lower frequency of nonfried tuber intake ( = 0.039), fried tubers ( < 0.001), milk desserts ( = 0.048), flour fritters ( = 0.027), cookies with chocolate ( = 0.050), croissants ( = 0.030), cookies with filling ( = 0.024), candies ( = 0.006), and soda ( = 0.016) than SOC. Overweight/obesity was not different between HNS and SOC ( > 0.05).

CONCLUSIONS

This study found significant differences in the consumption of some foods between HNS and SOC. However, it found no significant difference in diet and overweight/obesity between HNS and SOC.