Food & Health Alliance

Nestle Social Research Programme.  (2004).

Study that investigates young peoples values and motives about a healthy lifestyle in the U.K. 

Method:  Participants were taken from England, Scotland and Wales.  687 young people participated (aged 11 to 21 years old).  Participants completed questionnaires that investigate a range of topics such as demographic data, physical activity levels, sources of information, food preferences, etc.

Findings:  60% rate themselves as being either ‘fairly healthy’ or ‘fairly fit’, only 30% rate themselves as ‘very healthy’.  20% rate themselves as ‘fairly’ or ‘very unfit’.  50% of participants take part in exercise weekly. 

Many participants do not meet current physical activity guidelines.  Girls are more likely to monitor their health and aspire to greater weight loss than boys.  Boys are more likely to say that they never worry about their health, but more commonly overrate their fitness, in comparison to girls.  The most popular reasons for exercising are because of the environment and wanting to improve personal appearance.  Personal looks can be inhibitory for participation in physical activity.  

Other factors that were investigated in this study were: choice of food, perceived health risks, risk-taking behaviours and vegetarian behaviours.  Vegetarian participants were more tuned to making healthy behavioural choices, but were more reluctant to exercise. 

People from the South of the U.K. were least likely to regard themselves as healthy or to take part in different kinds of physical activities.  However people from Greater London were most likely to regard themselves as very fit, perhaps due to excellent access to facilities. 

Implications:  Any intervention to modify health behaviours must take into account self image and motivation.  The format via which information is communicated is very important.

Parents and doctors were rated as the most popular providers of health related information.  Girls also receive information from magazines, television and friends. Both boys and girls were motivated to be fitter.

Boys are less attuned to their own health and less likely to monitor their food intake.  Girls are more health aware and more likely to monitor their health, and are therefore more sensitive to health information.  However this can be problematic as girls may want to improve appearance, but may have an obsessive concerns about their weight.