Determining the correlation between the food literacy levels and attitude scale for healthy nutrition of adult individuals

Objective: The aim of the study is to determine the food literacy levels of adult individuals and their attitudes towards healthy eating and the correlation between them. Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional study was carried out with the snowball sampling method, with the participation of a total of 627 adults, 283 males and 344 females, between the ages of 18-65. An online questionnaire form (Google Forms) was used to collect the data. The data of the research were collected by e-survey method between August 2022 and May 2023. The data of the research consists of 3 main parts (socio-demographic characteristics, anthropometric measurements and questions about health histories and eating habits, attitude scale for healthy nutrition and self-perceived food literacy scale). Results: The ASHN score of the women (n:344; 77,44±10,44) participating in the study was found to be higher than the men (n:283; 73,31±10,15), and a significant difference was found (p<0,001). According to BMI, there was a difference between normal weight individuals (76,97±10,28) and overweight individuals (74,03±10,61) in terms of ASHN scores (p<0,01). It was determined that the participants in the study had a high level of attitude towards healthy eating attitudes. A statistically significant difference was found between food literacy levels according to gender, and the score of female participants (101,29±14,18) was higher than the score of male participants (93,96±13,29) (p<0,001). According to the BMI classification, the food literacy score of the normal weight participants (99,74±14,00) was higher than the obese participants (92,80±13,56). Total perceived food literacy scale mean score was found to be 97,98± 14,22. Individuals with a high attitude towards healthy eating were also found to have high food literacy (p<0,001). A moderate correlation was found between the participants attitudes scale for healthy nutrition scores and their perceived food literacy scale scores (r=0.428, p<0.001). Conclusion: In this study, it was concluded that the food literacy levels of adult individuals are effective on attitudes scale for healthy nutrition and there is a significant correlation between both scales. It was determined that there was a significant difference between the participants in terms of both attitudes towards healthy nutrition and food literacy levels in terms of gender, education level, dietary history, BMI groups, sources of nutritional information, regular physical activity and label reading frequency.