Co-occurrence of sleeping difficulties with urbanization and food choice in female university students.

Abstract

Introduction: Sleep is a basic and essential need of human beings, large number of sleep related problems are demonstrated in all age groups with different pro-moting factor( s), these may be biological, social, economical or environmental. Literature is scanty to identify co factors of sleep disturbances in apparently healthy females.Objective: To analyze association of sleep disorders in females with rural/ urban settings of living and certain dietary habits.Methodology: A cross sectional /survey-based study was performed in University of Sindh Jamshoro. The sample size (n) was 520.The data comprised of females aged between 18 -26 years. Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) was employed to assess sleep quality among the participants along with self-structured question-naire which was used for other variables such as consumption of junk food and its frequency of intake and breakfast intake.Results: Out of 520 participants, 310 (60%) were living in urban areas shows com-paratively higher frequency of poor sleep (n=262,50.5%; p=0.01-odd ratio=2.18) than those who were living in rural setups. Poor sleep was also observed in junk food eaters (n=304, 58%) however no association was observed in pattern of breakfast with sleep.Conclusion: The study concluded the prevalence of poor sleep was found more in urban female dwellers.Keywords: sleep, rural, urban, junk food, breakfast, Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI).