University students’ diet and lifestyle during winter vacation under COVID-19

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate the effects of the Coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19) on the diet and lifestyle of college students, using patterns of home training and meal kits. An online survey was conducted with 208 students from a university located in northern Gyeonggi Province. More male students were found to exercise “more than 3 days a week” (50% vs. 23.1%, p < 0.001) and practice home training “more than 3 days a week” (40.2% vs. 18.6%, p < 0.05) than their female counterparts. The most often practiced type of home training was “strength exercise” (59.8%) for male and “stretching” for female students (34.3%). The principal route for home training was “Youtube” (90.9%) without gender difference. About half of the participants ate lunch that was prepared by other family members, 29.8% cooked their own lunch, 12.5% ate delivered or takeout foods and 6.3% ate . While more female students used a meal kit than males (26.8 vs. 42.1%, p < 0.05), 68.0% used it “ ” and 73.3% answered that they use it for “convenience.” The six lowest dietary behaviors included “regular meal,” “eating green and yellow vegetables,” “milk&#8211;dairy intake,” “seaweed intake,” “breakfast meal,” and “regular exercise.” The associations of dietary scores were not consistent with the degree of watching mukbang and cookbang. The results of this study can provide basic information to develop nutrition education program to help college students improve their eating habits and lifestyle, especially in a disaster situation, such as during COVID-19.