Dietary Regimen, Overweight, and Obesity in Human Nutrition Students and Other Majors: A Cross-Sectional Study

Fernando D Solís-Guevara; Percy G Ruiz Mamani; Jacksaint Saintila

doi:10.1155/2022/9957690

Dietary Regimen, Overweight, and Obesity in Human Nutrition Students and Other Majors: A Cross-Sectional Study

J Nutr Metab. 2022 Mar 23:2022:9957690. doi: 10.1155/2022/9957690. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Fernando D Solís-Guevara^{1

2

3}, Percy G Ruiz Mamani⁴, Jacksaint Saintila^{1

3}

Affiliations

¹ Escuela de Nutrición Humana, Universidad Peruana Unión, Lima, Peru.
² Sociedad Científica de Estudiantes de Nutrición de la Universidad Peruana Unión (SOCENUT-UPeU), Lima, Peru.
³ Grupo de Investigación en Nutrición y Estilo de Vida (GINEV), Escuela de Nutrición Humana, Universidad Peruana Unión, Lima, Peru.
⁴ Escuela Profesional de Enfermería, Facultad de Ciencias de la Salud, Universidad Privada San Juan Bautista, Lima, Peru.

Abstract

Background: Choosing a healthy diet is an increasingly a challenge for university students. The objective of this study was to compare diet and overweight/obesity in human nutrition students (HNS) and students of other careers (SOC) from a university located in Lima, Peru.

Methods: It was a cross-sectional study consisting of 158 students out of an initial sample of 170. Information was collected on the sociodemographic and anthropometric characteristics of the participants and a validated questionnaire was applied to evaluate the frequency of food consumption.

Results: There was no significant difference in diet between HNS and SOC (p > 0.05). HNS most frequently consumed yellow/orange vegetables (p = 0.020), purple vegetables (p = 0.049), citrus fruits (p = 0.029), eggs (p = 0.002), whole milk (p = 0.013), yogurt (p = 0.017), tofu (p = 0.003), olive oil (p = 0.003), other vegetable oils (p < 0.001), and alcoholic beverages (p = 0.037) than SOC. In contrast, HNS had a lower frequency of nonfried tuber intake (p = 0.039), fried tubers (p < 0.001), milk desserts (p = 0.048), flour fritters (p = 0.027), cookies with chocolate (p = 0.050), croissants (p = 0.030), cookies with filling (p = 0.024), candies (p = 0.006), and soda (p = 0.016) than SOC. Overweight/obesity was not different between HNS and SOC (p > 0.05).

Conclusions: This study found significant differences in the consumption of some foods between HNS and SOC. However, it found no significant difference in diet and overweight/obesity between HNS and SOC.