The effect of consumers' health anxiety on organic food consumption and nutritional behaviors

This study was planned and conducted to examine the effects of consumers' health anxiety on their attitudes about organic foods, their organic food consumption status and nutritional behaviors. A total of 200 adult volunteers, 109 female and 91 male, aged between 18-65 years, living in Eskişehir, participated in the study. Research data were collected face to face with a questionnaire prepared by the researcher. Participants; demographic information, general questions about organic foods, Organic Food Consumption Scale (OFCS), Eating Awareness Scale (EAS), Health Anxiety Inventory (HAI) were answered and 24 hour retrospective food consumption record were obtained from the individuals and HEI-2015 (Healthy Eating index-2015) score has been calculated. 54.5% of the individuals are female and 45.5% are male, with a mean age of 30.57±9.07 years. More than half of the participants (n=135) have a normal-ideal body mass index (BMI). A statistically significant negative difference was found between HAI-total scores and OFC-total scores (p=0.016). It was determined that the HAI-total score parameter was an important parameter affecting the eating awareness status (p<0.05). It has been determined that the HEİ-2015 parameter is an important parameter affecting the state of eating awareness (p<0.05). It has been determined that the HEİ-2015 parameter is an important parameter affecting the state of eating awareness, and an increase of 1 unit in the HEİ-2015 scores will increase the levels of eating awareness by 2.5% (OR=1,025). As a result, it is possible to say that the awareness of eating is high in individuals with high health anxiety and healthy eating (high HEİ score) in the sample in which the research was conducted.