Major Dietary Patterns among Female Adolescent Girls of Talaat Intelligent Guidance School, Tabriz, Iran

BACKGROUND: Increasingly nutritional experts express the necessity of research on dietary patterns to identify numerous modifiable risk factors of disease. This study was conducted to identify major dietary patterns among adolescent girls in Talaat intelligent guidance school, Tabriz, Iran. METHODS: Among 257 adolescent girls aged 11-15 years, usual dietary intakes were assessed using a 162-item semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire (FFQ). Factor analysis was used to identify major dietary patterns in this Turkish population. RESULTS: We identified 6 major dietary patterns:(1) Western pattern high in pizza, meats and fruit juice; (2) Sweat junk foods pattern high in dried fruits, jams, honey and sugar; (3) Asian pattern high in legumes, potato and other vegetables; (4) Salty junk foods pattern high in carrot, puffs and potato chips and (6) Iranian traditional dietary pattern high in hydrogenated fats, garlic and broth. CONCLUSION: Our findings suggested that among the 6 major dietary patterns, Asian-like food was the healthiest one.