The Big Three Health Behaviors and Mental Health and Well-Being Among Young Adults: A Cross-Sectional Investigation of Sleep, Exercise, and Diet

Abstract

BackgroundSleep, physical activity, and diet have been associated with mental health and well-being individually in young adults. However, which of these “big three” health behaviors most strongly predicts mental health and well-being, and their higher-order relationships in predictive models, is less known. This study investigated the differential and higher-order associations between sleep, physical activity, and dietary factors as predictors of mental health and well-being in young adults.MethodIn a cross-sectional survey design, 1,111 young adults (28.4% men) ages 18–25 from New Zealand and the United States answered an online survey measuring typical sleep quantity and quality; physical activity; and consumption of raw and processed fruit and vegetables, fast food, sweets, and soda, along with extensive covariates (including demographics, socioeconomic status, body mass index, alcohol use, smoking, and health conditions) and the outcome measures of depressive symptoms [measured by the Center for Epidemiological Depression Scale (CES-D)] and well-being (measured by the Flourishing Scale).ResultsControlling for covariates, sleep quality was the strongest predictor of depressive symptoms and well-being, followed by sleep quantity and physical activity. Only one dietary factor—raw fruit and vegetable consumption—predicted greater well-being but not depressive symptoms when controlling for covariates. There were some higher-order interactions among health behaviors in predicting the outcomes, but these did not survive cross-validation.ConclusionSleep quality is an important predictor of mental health and well-being in young adults, whereas physical activity and diet are secondary but still significant factors. Although strictly correlational, these patterns suggest that future interventions could prioritize sleep quality to maximize mental health and well-being in young adults.

Association of a Mediterranean Diet and Fruit and Vegetable Consumption with Subjective Well-Being among Adults with Overweight and Obesity

“…It is possible that our results are due to insuffi-cient consideration of the exact amount of FV servings per day; it has been stated that FV consumption and SWB indicators have a linear dose-response relationship [19,20,60,64,65] and that optimal intake is ≥7-8 servings per day [19,20,26], something that has also been postulated for physical and mental health outcomes [66], although others have indicated that minimal increments in consumption not reaching the "5 a day" recommendation are also associated with substantial increases in happiness [60,64], overall health, and quality of life [67]. Another possible explanation is that it has been demonstrated that raw compared to prepared FV is more associated with increments in SWB [24,27]. Future research is needed to reach more consistent findings.…”

“…Some studies have included individuals with overweight and obesity in their samples (e.g., [21][22][23]), but have not analyzed possible differences. A few studies aiming to explore the influence of BMI or weight status did not support an influence for positive indicators of well-being, and contradictory findings were obtained for negative indicators; however, these studies were conducted with young adults in the normal range of weight status (e.g., [24][25][26][27]). In contrast, some findings with populationbased samples (e.g., [23]) tend to support the same pattern.…”

The value of Bayesian predictive projection for variable selection: An example selecting lifestyle predictors of young adult well-being

“…The rst predictor selected into the submodel was sleep quality -how refreshed participants felt after waking up, on their average day. Sleep quality has been consistently shown to be one of the strongest predictors of well-being, especially in young adults, with poor sleep quality being strongly linked to poor mental health outcomes including symptoms of depression (Pilcher et al, 1997;Ridner et al, 2016;Wallace et al, 2017;S.-R. Wickham et al, 2020;Wilson et al, 2014). Additionally, while sleep quality has often been shown to be an important predictor of well-being, sleep quantity has not (Pilcher et al, 1997;Wallace et al, 2017), and this is congruent with our results -while sleep quality was entered into the submodels early along the feature selection trajectory, sleep quantity was only entered long after any improvement in predictive accuracy was shown, indicating a lack of predictive power.…”

“…However, based on the 1 SE rule, fruit consumption only was su cient to approximate the reference model's predictions, suggesting that fruit consumption may contain enough information about the quality of one's diet to make other diet-related predictors redundant. Additionally, there is evidence that raw fruit and vegetables are stronger predictors of well-being than cooked fruit and vegetables (Brookie et al, 2018;S.-R. Wickham et al, 2020), and since fruit is more often eaten raw, general fruit consumption may be a stronger indicator of good diet than vegetable consumption. Be it as it may, sleep quality, having trouble concentrating, and fruit consumption are all meaningful predictors within the well-being literature.…”

Association of Sedentary Behavior and Physical Activity with Depression in Sport University Students

“…PA has been shown to be associated with depression among university students [ 7 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 ]. Some evidence suggests that high levels of PA can play a protective role as a counter to the negative effects of SB on all causes of mortality [ 15 ], and on self-reported mental and social health outcomes in some regions [ 16 ].…”