Investigation of physical activity levels and nutritional habits of individuals during the COVID-19 pandemic period

Introduction and Aim: Scientific evidence indicates that regular physical activity and healthy eating habits are keys determinant of health. The Covid-19 pandemic process affects people's living habits quite a lot. The aim of this study is to determine the physical activity levels of individuals before and after coronavirus and their attitudes towards healthy eating. Materials and Methods: The sample of the study consists of individuals between the ages of 18-65 living in Erzurum. The study group of the research consists of 439 people (215 men and 224 women) who were selected by simple random method and participated in the research voluntarily. Personal Information Form, International Physical Activity Scale Short Form and Attitude towards Healthy Eating Scale were used as data collection tools in the study. The personal information form was created by the researcher to determine the demographic information of the participants. The questionnaires were applied twice, considering the physical activity levels and nutritional habits before and during the pandemic. In the analysis of the data, besides the descriptive statistics, the Independent Sample t-Test was used to determine the differences for two independent groups, the One-Factor Analysis of Variance (One Way Anova) to determine the differences for more than two groups, and the Pearson Correlation Analysis for the relationship comparisons. Results: According to the results of the study, the physical activity levels of men are higher than women, those living in rural areas are statistically higher than people living in the city, but this difference disappears during the pandemic are found. The physical activity levels of individuals between the ages of 40-49 are statistically significantly higher. Also it has been determined that the state of having Covid-19 disease does not significantly affect the physical activity levels, and the physical activity levels of individuals decreased during the pandemic process. Conclusions: It was found a law positive correlation between the level of physical activity and behavior of the healthy nutrition during the pandemic period. It has been observed that the physical activity levels of individuals have decreased during the Covid-19 pandemic process. Considering the indistinctness of the end of the pandemic and the possible disadvantages of low physical activity level in this process, it can be said that they should increase their physical activity levels. Keywords: Physical Activity, Nutritional Habits, Covid 19