Comparison of Eating Habits of Students at University of Medical Sciences and Tabriz University

Food habits are one of the most important factors that influence health and can reduce risk of chronic diseases such as heart disease, stroke, cancers, diabetes etc. What is certain is that students during the student life, may acquire many habits that can promote or threaten their health. The purpose of this study was to compare the eating behavior of Tabriz University and Tabriz University of Medical Sciences Students.
This descriptive-Comparison study was performed on a sample of 768 students of medical and nonmedical universities of Tabriz. Data was collected from self-report questionnaire with two parts. The first part was about the student's demographic characteristics, and the next part was about dietary habits with 13 questions. For data analysis, descriptive statistics and Two-Way ANOVA and independent t-test was used.
Results showed that the majority of both of the universities students (60.16% of medical science and 64.06% of nonmedical science students) had poor eating habits. T-test showed that there were no significant differences between two university students considering dietary habits. (t=1.402, p=0/161)
Unhealthy eating habits of university students make clearer that the main action for modification of dietary habits of them is needed for the prevention of non-communicable diseases among university students as young and active people.