Relationship of BMI with Junk Food, sleep pattern, exam performance and awareness about its ill health effects in healthy teenagers

Objective: To evaluate the relationship of body mass index of healthy teenagers with junk food, sleep pattern, exam performance and awareness about its ill effects.

Methods: The cross-sectional study was conducted from March to June 2017 at University Medical and Dental College, University of Faisalabad, Faisalabad, Pakistan, and comprised subjects aged 13-19. Data was collected using face-to-face interviews, getting the examnation results from respective educational insititutions and calculating the body mass index, Data was analysed using SPSS 22.

Results: Of the 226 subjects, 96(42.5%) were boys with a mean age of 15.68 ±1.83 years, and 130(57.5%) were girls with a mean age of 17.00±1.74 years. Based on body mass index, 35(15.5%) subjects were underweight, 88(39%) were normal, 28(12.4%) overweight, 56(24.7%) pre-obese and 19(8.4%) were obese. The independent predictors of body mass index were higher consumption of soft drinks in males and higher consumption of soft drinks and salt in females (p < 0.05).

Conclusion: Teenagers were found to be well aware of the ill effects of junk food, but they were found to be happy with their dietary habits and unwilling to change it.