Fatores associados ao consumo de alimentos ultraprocessados em estudantes do ensino superior
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23549789Palavras-chave:
alimentos ultraprocessados; comportamento alimentar; estudantes; duração do sono; estresse psicológico; conhecimentos, atitudes e prática em saúdeResumo
Introdução: o consumo de alimentos ultraprocessados tornou-se uma prática comum entre estudantes universitários de todo o mundo, apesar da conscientização generalizada sobre seus efeitos adversos à saúde.
Objetivo: identificar fatores associados à frequência de consumo de alimentos ultraprocessados em estudantes do ensino superior.
Método: estudo observacional, descritivo e transversal de 636 estudantes de três universidades de Quintana Roo, México. Foi aplicado um questionário que avaliou características sociodemográficas, consumo de alimentos ultraprocessados, percepções do ambiente alimentar universitário, qualidade do sono, alimentação noturna e sintomas emocionais. As associações bivariadas foram analisadas com o teste exato de Fisher com estimação de Monte Carlo para contagens esperadas pequenas (α=0,05).
Resultados: 39,6% dos estudantes consumiam alimentos ultraprocessados muitas vezes por semana. A frequência de consumo de alimentos ultraprocessados associou-se significativamente à autopercepção do grau de processamento dos alimentos (p<0,001), poucas horas de sono (p<0,001), despertar noturno com apetite (p<0,001), forte desejo de comer entre o jantar e a hora de dormir (p<0,001) e comer em excesso relacionado a estresse/ansiedade/depressão (p=0,008).
Conclusões: o consumo de alimentos ultraprocessados nos estudantes está determinado mais pelo perfil sociodemográfico do que pelas emoções, e por fatores relacionados ao sono imersos em um ambiente alimentar permissivo. Nesse sentido, é necessário promover estratégias que combinem educação nutricional com intervenções ambientais e psicossociais, necessárias para promover hábitos alimentares mais saudáveis entre os estudantes universitários.
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Copyright (c) 2026 María de Lourdes Rojas Armadillo, Edgar Fernando Peña Torres, Nissa Yaing Torres-Soto, Beatriz Martínez Ramírez, Ángel Gabriel Montero Lara, Kevin Omar Polanco Tzek
Este trabalho está licenciado sob uma licença Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
