The relationship of functional foods with eating attitudes and eating awareness of graduate educational individuals in the COVID-19 period

Objective: This study was planned to examine the relationship between functional food awareness and eating attitudes and eating awareness of individuals who received postgraduate education during the COVID-19 period. Materials and Methods: The study is a cross-sectional study and a relational screening model was used in the study. 350 volunteer participants were included in the study. The sample was created between January – March 2022. Demographic Information Form, Functional Food Information Form, Eating Attitude Test (EAT-26) and Eating Awareness Scale (EAS-30) were used to collect data. Results: The differences between the scale scores of the individuals according to the demographic and functional food knowledge variables were examined. A statistically significant difference was found in EAT-26 scores according to the COVID-19 vaccination status of the graduate individuals and the status of seeing themselves as healthy. A statistically significant difference was found in EAS-30 scores according to gender, age, COVID-19 weight change status, self-seeing health status, knowledge about functional foods, and functional food consumption status. In addition, no statistically significant correlation was observed between EAT-26 and EAS-30 scores. Conclusion: It is thought that this research will make an important contribution to the related literature. We believe that making the nutritional contents more visual can have positive effects on functional food consumption. Keywords: Covid-19, Functional nutrition, Eating awareness, Eating attitude.