Associations entre la connaissance des recommandations du Programme national nutrition santé et les comportements en matière d’alimentation et d’activité physique

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BackgroundNutrition education is one of the main lines of the French nutrition policy that has been undertaken for several years. The underlying hypothesis of this approach is that knowledge improvement is one of the ways likely to contribute to health-enhancing diet and physical activity. The objective of this paper, based on the 2008 Health and nutrition Barometer, is to examine the associations observed between knowledge and behavior with regard to diet and physical activity. MethodsThe 2008 Health and nutrition Barometer is a nationally representative telephone survey conducted on 4714 individuals aged 12–75years. For six recommendations of the National Nutrition and Health Program (Programme national nutrition santé [PNNS]), multiple logistic models were used to identify associations between knowledge of these recommendations and behavior, among adults aged 18–75years. For food consumed on the day before the interview, odds ratios were adjusted for sex, age, education level, agglomeration size and region. As bivariate analysis showed that income level was significant for recommended consumption of fish, this variable was introduced among adjustment variables. Similarly, the variable occupation was introduced for physical activity. ResultsA positive association between knowledge of recommendations and nutritional behavior on the day before interview was observed for fruit and vegetables (OR=1.7), dairy products (OR=1.6), and starchy food (OR=1.6). The same was observed for consumption of fish during the 15days before the interview (OR=5.0) and for physical activity during a usual week (OR=1.5) but not for the “meat, seafood and eggs” food group. ConclusionEating habits and physical activity are positively associated with knowledge of nutritional recommendations, mainly acquired via nutritional information and educational actions. Nevertheless, the important differences observed for certain dietary groups between knowledge of recommendations and dietary intake emphasizes the need to further support individual-focused initiatives with health-enhancing environmental strategies.