Personality and dietary supplement use among Japanese female students

Abstract

Objectives The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between dietary supplement use and personality traits among Japanese female students.Methods A cross-sectional questionnaire survey was administered to 230 female university or junior college students in October and November 2015; 228 students responded. The questionnaires inquired regarding the usage of dietary supplements and attitudes about dietary supplements, as well as the healthy eating literacy (HEL) scale and the Big Five personality traits. In total, 124 respondents completed the survey. The Mann-Whitney U test, Kruskal-Wallis test, chi-square test, and Spearman's correlation coefficient were used to examine dietary supplement-personality relationships.Results Overall, 19.4% of students reported using dietary supplements. Supplement users had high extraversion scores compared with non-users. Attitudes about dietary supplements and HEL were not associated with personality traits.Conclusion Personality traits influenced dietary supplement use, although limitedly.