Consumption Pattern of Unhealthy Food Items among Adolescents- A Survey

Abstract

The aim of the study was to assess consumption pattern of the unhealthy food items (fried food, fried rice, puffs, parata, burger etc) and its association with age and gender among adolescents aged 13 to 18 years in Chennai. An exploratory survey was conducted and a convenient sampling technique was used to select 300 samples. Structured questionnaire was used to collect the data from 300 adolescents and the data was analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics. The findings revealed that majority of the adolescents had unhealthy dietary habits. Seventy nine percentage of the samples were male and 21% of them were female. Majority of the adolescents (88.3%) were non vegetarian and 47% of the adolescents reported that their food choice was influenced by friends. Majority (47%) of the adolescents consumed potato chips, 45% consumed fried chicken, 31% consumed chocolate, 39% consumed biscuits, 23.7% consumed ice creams, 49.7% consumed coke/pepsi in common. There was a significant association found between consumption of unhealthy food items with age and gender at 0.05 level of significance.