Determining the relationship between physical activity and intuitive eating and mindful eating in university students

Year 2024, Volume: 8 Issue: 2, 301 - 314, 27.06.2024

Fatma Mert Biberoğlu , Sanem Güven , Zeynep Güler Yenipınar

https://doi.org/10.31015/jaefs.2024.2.7

Abstract

In this study, it was aimed to determine the relationship between physical activity and intuitive eating (IE) and mindful eating (ME) in university students. The “International Physical Activity Short Form”, “Mindful Eating Test (MET)” and “Intuitive Eating Scale (IES)” were applied by questioning the demographic characteristics, anthropometric measurements, health information and nutritional habits of 255 university students studying in Health and Sports sciences. Among the students whose mean age is 20.34±2.06, 86.7% of the students who are in health science are female, and 67.7% of them, who are in sports sciences are male (p<0.05). Students (51.4%) with normal Body Mass Index (BMI) consume three main meals and go on a diet for aesthetic reasons. Eating discipline (ED), emotional eating (EE), and intuitive eating total (IET) scores are higher in females, while control of eating (EC) scores are higher in males (p<0.05). Intuitive eating total score, reliance on hunger and satiety cues (RHSC), unconditional permission to eat (UPE) and EC cores are positively related to BMI. Students who are physically inactive have higher IET score, RHSC, body-food choice congruence, focusing and ED, and those who do adequate physical activity have higher eating control scores (p<0.05). Mindful eating total score and sub-dimensions are positively correlated with the score of all sub-dimensions except UPE, which is one of the sub-dimensions of IE (p<0.05). In addition, as the UPE score increases, the total scores of disinhibitions, ED, focusing, interference, EE, and ME decrease (p<0.05). In conclusion, ME and IE are positively related to each other. It is understood that adequate and balanced nutrition along with being physically active at the same time is quite important for younger individuals to be healthier.

Keywords

Intuitive eating, mindful eating, physical activity

Ethical Statement

Ethics committee approval was obtained from the Ethics Committee of İstanbul Rumeli University with the desicion no 02 dated 20.05.2022

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