University students in Central Italy: do they follow proper dietary habits?

Abstract

Eating a healthy diet is acknowledged as one of the main factors in preventing malnutrition and non-communicable diseases. As young students represent a group more prone to poor dietary habits, the aim of this study was to analyse the dietary habits of a group of undergraduate students attending university in a city of central Italy, Siena. 4,700 students were invited to participate in a cross-sectional study completing an online self-administered questionnaire about their food habits. The obtained data were analysed by Microsoft Excel 2021 and Stata 17 software, through the Mann-Whitney and the Kruskal-Wallis test; a p-value < 0.05 was considered statistically significant. The students living at home consumed more fruit, vegetables, pasta, meat, fish, packaged foods, fruit juices, beer and wine; the only statistically significant differences were found for pizza and snacks. Even the gender influenced the consumption of many foods; women consumed more vegetables and coffee/tea, while males ate more pasta, meat, packaged foods, pizza, fries and beer. With the transition from secondary school to university, students are continuously challenged to make healthful food choices and they must be self-disciplined to take care of themselves. It would be important for health campaigns to be promoted in young adults to help them make the right choices.