Breakfast Habit and Nutritional Status of Undergraduates in Ekiti State, Nigeria

Abstract

Abstract:The study was carried out to assess the breakfast consumption habit and nutritional status of undergraduates in Ekiti State, Nigeria. Two hundred and fifty students comprising of 186 female and 64 male were randomly selected in two higher institutions. A self administered questionnaire which elicits information on socio-demographic data and breakfast habit of the students was used. Nutrients intake of the respondents was assess using 24 hour dietary recall while the Body Mass Index (BMI) was used to assess the nutritional status of the respondents. The result revealed that 76.2% of the respondents were female while 23.8% were male. Slightly above average (52.8%) were within the age range of 16-20 years while 36.8% received more than ₦10, 000 as feeding allowances. In general, 52% of the students reported not to be taking breakfast on the day of the survey and 40.8% attributed this to insufficient feeding allowances. Nutritional status assessment showed that there was no significant difference (Χ 2 =4.16; P=0.24) between breakfast skipping and BMI. The 24 hour dietary analysis showed that there was a significant (P<0.05) difference between the mean protein and fat intake of breakfast skippers and eaters. The mean nutrients intake of breakfast skippers and eaters were; energy (2315.4kcal vs 2229.6kcal), protein (52.6g vs 58.4g), fat (42.1g vs 33.0g), carbohydrate (324.3g vs 306.3g), iron (12.4mg vs 12.6mg), and calcium (1106.2mg vs 1157.9mg ). The study concluded majority of the students' skip breakfast, a reflection of insufficient feeding allowances, busy schedule and weight control measures. The study then recommends that parents should increase the feeding allowances of their children that are in tertiary institutions.

Feeding habits, Overweight, Obesity and Hypertension and Associated Factors among Polytechnic Students in Ekiti State, Southwest Nigeria

“…The prevalence of general overweight and obesity measured by BMI was below one fifth, this was in line with other studies in Nigeria (Ayodele et al, 2009;Olusanya & Omotayo, 2011;Olufemi & Abiodun, 2013;Nmor et al, 2014;Odili et al, 2014;Bagi et al, 2017;Ukegbu et al, 2017;Maduka et al, 2017) and other African countries (Kolawole et al, 2017;Deng et al, 2017) and Asia (Kutty et al, 2015;Ren et al, 2015;Irfan, 2018). It was lower than other Nigerian studies which ranged from 20% to 60% (Adesola et al, 2014;Oladoyinbo & Ekerette, 2015;Agwu et al, 2017;The GBD 2015Obesity Collaborators, 2017Sedodo et al, 2020;Kayode & Alabi, 2020) and other countries in Africa (Moussa et al, 2016;Niba et al, 2017), Asia (Davar, 2015), America (Katuka et al, 2016;Deng et al, 2017) and Europe (Sofia et al, 2015). The findings of Alhaj & Alqubaty (2020) among private university students in Yemen show a higher prevalence.…”

“…A large proportion of the students skipped meals and breakfast was the frequently skipped meal with about half of them. This was lower than the finding of Adesola et al (2014) with of abdominal obesity. The waist-to-hip ratio (Table 4) reveals that students ≤ 20 years (63.2%) were at risk of central obesity and it was higher in females (100.0%) than males (0.0%) and in students that were receiving monthly allowance <₦30,000.00 (64.7%).…”

Breakfast Eating Habits and Its Influence on Nutritional Status

“…12 In our study, it was found that the prevalence of breakfast skipping among nursing students was 214 (48.97%). In a similar study conducted by Adesola et al 13 in Nigeria reported that approximately 52% of students skip breakfast with 40.8% as low feeding allowances. Correspondingly, another study conducted on skipping breakfast and nutritional status among school children studying in 5th, 6th, and 7th grade from city of Salta found that approximately 55.1% of students skip breakfast out of 283 students.…”

Impact of Breakfast Skipping and Choices on The Nutrient Intake and BMI of University Hostel Students of Lahore

“…With the help of subject-matter specialists, a pre-tested semi-structured questionnaire was created based on earlier research investigations (Oladapo Adenike et al, 2014). It was designed to gather data on demographics, breakfast habits, and related factors, respondents' nutritional status, and respondents' intake of nutrients based on a 72-hour food recall.…”