Evaluating the emotional variations and eating tendency relation in adolescents

This study was planned to investigate the relationship between emotion changes and eating tendencies in adolescents and to determine the preferred foods to be consumed during different emotions. The study was conducted on 193 students (62 males, 131 females) between the age of 10-19 studying Çankaya Bilgi Temel High School in Ankara between September and October 2018. General information about adolescents, health status of individuals, emotion changes (sad / unhappy, anxious / anxious, exam stress, happiness, weak/ sick, feeling of failure, feeling loneliness and disappointment) and questions about the eating relationship, The Dutch Eating Behavior Questionnaire (DEBQ) was administered and evaluated with the emotional eating subscale. Anthropometric measurements of the participants were determined. Of the participants in the study, 32.1% were male and 67.9% were female and the mean age was 16.2 ± 1.2 years. The BMI-z scores of the adolescents in our study were 79.7% normal, 12.9% were overweight, 4.8% were obese and 2.6% were underweight. The adolescents feel sad / unhappy, worry / anxiety, exam stress, sick / weak, failure, loneliness, disappointment when they said ''eating less'', when they feel happy when they said ''no change'' and they are determined statistically by gender. (p <0.05). When we look at the preference of food, it is seen that chocolate is the first preferred food in all emotion situations. Gender, age, diagnosed disease status, physical activity and BMI-z score were not statistically significant (p> 0.05). Participants with The Dutch Eating Behavior Questionnaire-emotional eating subscale to identify emotional eating tendencies of 8 when we look at the relationship of different mood statistically significant but not sad / unhappy, worry / anxiety, exam stress, happy, lonely, dissappointment positive correlation in felt mood. As a result, it is determined that adolescents tend to eat less often while they are in negative emotions and they prefer to eat high-energy snacks.