Consumo de alimentos y ultra procesados en estudiantes de la carrera de Nutrición, Dietética y Estética de la UCSG durante el periodo pandemia Covid-19.

Abstract

Ultra-processed foods attract the attention of young students because of the vast variety of products offered and because they are easy to prepare, less time-consuming, more appetizing, and cheaper. The objective of this study is to determine the consumption of ultra-processed foods and to identify the eating behaviors of the students that study Nutrition, Dietetics and Aesthetics at the Catholic University of Santiago de Guayaquil; this is a descriptive, observational, cross-sectional study. The tools used in this study were the eating behavior questionnaire and a frequency of consumption according to the NOVA classification tables. In the survey, we found that 96% of the students do have healthy behaviors while the remaining 4% do not. This survey also has the ability to measure four factors that have influence overeating behaviors, of which the health status factor was the one with the highest unhealthy behaviors, while the food preference factor had the highest healthy behaviors. In the frequency of consumption, we observe that junk food is consumed by 69% of the students, the second most consumed food group is dairy of the NOVA 3 classification with 56% and the third food group is seafood represented by 52%. Most of the students have a good judgment of how to eat properly, but the consumption of ultra-processed foods and beverages is alarming, which is worrying since these foods have the characteristic of being harmful to health.