EATING HABITS OF GOVERNMENT HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS

Abstract

Nutrition and eating habits are closely connected, both have been of great importance for health and wellbeing in life. This paper analyzes selected eating habits among students, the causes of these habits and its impact on their health and academic performance. It is a descriptive cross sectional study. In this study, 326 students were randomly selected from two government high schools in Thimphu, Bhutan. Data entry and analysis was done using SPSS software. Out of 326 students, 72.1% were girls and 27.9% were boys, ranging from 13 to 20 years of age. Students mid-term grade were significantly associated with dairy (P. value of 0.009), water consumption (P. value of 0.018) and age (P. value of 0.10). However overall academic performance was found to be associated with monthly family income, education level of parents, missing breakfast and lunch, junk food, meat, vegetable and canteen food consumption. This study suggests that academic performance may be dependent on consumption of water and dairy products in addition to age and gender. Health education programs should be implemented to raise awareness about food consumption and its health and academic performance.