The creation of a healthy eating motivation score and its association with food choice and physical activity in a cross sectional sample of Irish adults

International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity

Research

Mary B. McCarthy¹  Sinéad N. McCarthy²  Paul Naughton³ 

[1] Department of Food Business and Development, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland;Food Market & Consumer Research Group, Department of Agrifood Business & Spatial Analysis, Teagasc Food Research Centre, Ashtown, 15, Dublin, Ireland;Food Market & Consumer Research Group, Department of Agrifood Business & Spatial Analysis, Teagasc Food Research Centre, Ashtown, 15, Dublin, Ireland;School of Agriculture, Food and Rural Development, Newcastle University, NE1 7RU, Newcastle Upon Tyne, UK;

关键词: Food choice attitudes;    Motivation;    Activity;    Dietary recommendation;    Food consumption survey;   

DOI  :  10.1186/s12966-015-0234-0

 received in 2014-11-28, accepted in 2015-05-22,  发布年份 2015

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundThis study aimed to develop a healthy eating motivation score and to determine if dietary, lifestyle and activity behaviours vary across levels of motivation to eat a healthy diet with a view to informing health promotion interventions.MethodsA cross-sectional survey of food intake, physical activity, lifestyles and food choice attitudes was conducted in a nationally representative sample of 1262 adults in the Republic of Ireland aged 18 years and over.ResultsIncreasing score for health motivation was significantly and positively related to healthy eating and exercise. Women, increasing age, normal BMI, regular exercise and increasing intakes of fruit and vegetables were associated with a higher odds ratio (OR) for having a high healthy eating motivation score. However, despite a high motivation score only 31 % of consumers in the strong motivation group achieved the recommendations for daily fruit and vegetable consumption, while 57 % achieved the fat recommendation. A higher intake of calorie dense foods from the top shelf of the food pyramid and increased time spent watching T.V. was associated with a decreased OR for positive motivation towards healthy eating.ConclusionsHealthy eating promotions directed at women and older adults should focus on supporting people’s motivations to attain a healthy diet by addressing issues such as dietary self-control and self-regulation. For men and younger adults, healthy eating promotions will need to address the issues underlying their weak attitudes towards healthy eating.

【 授权许可】

Unknown   
© Naughton et al. 2015. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.

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