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University Students Eating Habits: Normal Semester vs. Lockdown Period Caused by COVID-19 Pandemic

In the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, university students’ eating habits may change due to the stress caused by mandatory full lockdown and social isolation, as well as uncertainty about their academic future. An analysis of 332 Portuguese university students from different areas of study was carrie...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Monteiro, Mónica, Ferreira-Pêgo, Cíntia
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9565997/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36232047
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph191912750
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author Monteiro, Mónica
Ferreira-Pêgo, Cíntia
author_facet Monteiro, Mónica
Ferreira-Pêgo, Cíntia
author_sort Monteiro, Mónica
collection PubMed
description In the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, university students’ eating habits may change due to the stress caused by mandatory full lockdown and social isolation, as well as uncertainty about their academic future. An analysis of 332 Portuguese university students from different areas of study was carried out through an online questionnaire to verify if the lockdown period caused by COVID-19 had any influence on the students’ eating habits, as well as if this differed among students from health sciences courses and those from other areas. We found that, compared to a normal semester of classes, during the lockdown period, healthier eating habits were adopted, characterized by a decrease in meal delivery platforms used, self-reported consumption of fast-food, pre-cooked meals, foods rich in sugar and salt, and sugar-sweetened and alcoholic beverages, as well as increased self-reported consumption of vegetables, fruit and legumes, and physical exercise. Thus, although the lockdown led to stress and uncertainty, university students were able to take care of their eating habits and lifestyle, probably as a way of feeling stronger and safer against this disease.
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spelling pubmed-95659972022-10-15 University Students Eating Habits: Normal Semester vs. Lockdown Period Caused by COVID-19 Pandemic Monteiro, Mónica Ferreira-Pêgo, Cíntia Int J Environ Res Public Health Article In the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, university students’ eating habits may change due to the stress caused by mandatory full lockdown and social isolation, as well as uncertainty about their academic future. An analysis of 332 Portuguese university students from different areas of study was carried out through an online questionnaire to verify if the lockdown period caused by COVID-19 had any influence on the students’ eating habits, as well as if this differed among students from health sciences courses and those from other areas. We found that, compared to a normal semester of classes, during the lockdown period, healthier eating habits were adopted, characterized by a decrease in meal delivery platforms used, self-reported consumption of fast-food, pre-cooked meals, foods rich in sugar and salt, and sugar-sweetened and alcoholic beverages, as well as increased self-reported consumption of vegetables, fruit and legumes, and physical exercise. Thus, although the lockdown led to stress and uncertainty, university students were able to take care of their eating habits and lifestyle, probably as a way of feeling stronger and safer against this disease. MDPI 2022-10-05 /pmc/articles/PMC9565997/ /pubmed/36232047 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph191912750 Text en © 2022 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Monteiro, Mónica
Ferreira-Pêgo, Cíntia
University Students Eating Habits: Normal Semester vs. Lockdown Period Caused by COVID-19 Pandemic
title University Students Eating Habits: Normal Semester vs. Lockdown Period Caused by COVID-19 Pandemic
title_full University Students Eating Habits: Normal Semester vs. Lockdown Period Caused by COVID-19 Pandemic
title_fullStr University Students Eating Habits: Normal Semester vs. Lockdown Period Caused by COVID-19 Pandemic
title_full_unstemmed University Students Eating Habits: Normal Semester vs. Lockdown Period Caused by COVID-19 Pandemic
title_short University Students Eating Habits: Normal Semester vs. Lockdown Period Caused by COVID-19 Pandemic
title_sort university students eating habits: normal semester vs. lockdown period caused by covid-19 pandemic
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9565997/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36232047
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph191912750
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