The Relationship between Late Dinner and Breakfast Skipping Behavior

Abstract

This paper attempts to find out causes of breakfast skipping behavior among Japanesewomen college students by examining their lifestyes including eating styles through aquestionnaire survey. The findings are as follows:1) About 35 percent of the respondents have dinner after 8:00 p.m., and 45 percent ofthem do so because of their part-time jobs. 40 percent of the women students eat dinnerat irregular times, and the later they eat, the more irregular their dinner time becomes.2) The students'lifetyles tend to be night-oriented: 86 percent of tnem go to bed aftermidnight, and the average students sleep for 6 hours and 29 minutes.3) Many of the students eat and/or drink after dinner, eat 70% and drink 92%;Tea andsnacks are most favored.4) 32 percent of the students wake up before 7:00 a. m., 43 percent between 7:00 a. m. and8:00 a. m., and 25 percent after 8:00 a. m. Those who eat breakfast erery day make up66 percent, 5 or 6 days per week 14 percent, and one through 4 days 15 percent respec-tively: 5% of the students do not eat breakfast at all. Those who eat breakfatst do so ap-proximately 20 minutes after waking up.5) Multiple comparisons among dinner time, regularity of eating dinner, sleeping hours, and frequency of cating breakfast show that late dinner time, irregularity of eating din-ner, and short sleeping hours all contribute to breakfast skipping behavior.6) 70 percent of their dinner contents consists only of main dishes and drinks, but fewstudents care much about nuturition.