Assessment of Dietary Habits in Greek Adolescents

Ioanna Tsamita, Polina Kontogianni, & Konstantinos Karteroliotis

Department of Physical Education and Sport Science, Kapodistrian University of Athens, Hellas

Abstract

Healthy eating habits are considered to be very important for improving a person’s health and for pre- venting biological dysfunctions. During adolescence there are a number of factors that may affect a person’s dietary habits (DH) and in the long term the health during adulthood as well. The aim of the present study was the evaluation of the DH of 321 students and the examination of the relationships among DH, demographic and personal factors, such as self-efficacy for consuming fruits and vegetables and importance of healthy diet. Results indicated that students consume the recommended servings of milk products and fruits only, while their dietary habits included mainly unhealthy foods. Girls and younger students have healthier DH than boys and older students, respectively. Self-efficacy for consuming fruits and vegetables were positively related to diary products, fruits, and vegetables and negatively related to unhealthy food consumption. In conclusion, Greek adolescents, even if they still consume enough fruits and milk products, they tend to adopt the Western diet that consists of a lot of unhealthy foods. In attempt to adopt healthy eating habits in adolescents a number of demographic and personal factors, such as self-efficacy for consuming fruits and vegetables and importance of healthy diet should be examined. These results reveal the emergency of planning and applying intervention programs in school and family environments, in order to guide adolescents to consume healthier foods.

Keywords: healthy eating habits, self-efficacy, high school