Investigation of nutrition attitudes of young athletes in different sport branches

The aim of this study was to investigate nutrition attitudes of athletes in different sport branches and the factors affecting them The universe of the study composed of athletes from different branches and the sample of the study consisted of 1291 athletes aged 14-19 from different provinces of Turkey. "Attitude Scale for Healthy Nutrition (ASHN)" developed by Tekkurşun Demir and Cicioğlu, (2019) were used to collect data. The normality distribution of the data was determined using Kolmogorov-Smirnov normality test. For the scores obtained from inventory, Independent Samples t test was utilized in paired comparisons and, One-Way ANOVA and Tukey HSD tests were utilized in multiple comparisons in SPSS 22.0 statistical package program. The descriptive data are shown as percentages, means, and standard deviations and the threshold for statistical significance was accepted p<0,05. According to the statistical analysis results, it was seen that the total score of ASHN and sub-dimensions scores of the athletes were high. The sub-dimensions scores were respectively information on nutrition (IN) 20,44; emotion for nutrition (EN) 18,11; positive nutrition (PN) 19,91 and malnutrition (MP) 10,20. A significant difference was found in favor of male in positive nutrition dimension of the scale in terms of gender (p<0,05). In 18-19 ages, ASHN total score and information on nutrition sub-dimension scores were higher than other two age groups (p<0,05). According to sport age and national athlete's variable, there are significant differences in ASHN total score, IN and PN sub-dimension scores in favor of 7 age over and national athletes (p<0,05). Athletes that family income 8001 tl and over were higher than other income groups in IN, PN and MP; athletes have 6001-8000 tl family income were higher than other groups in EN and ASHN total score. Information on nutrition (IN) sub-dimension scores of the athletes living in the city was higher than living in the village and malnutrition (MP) sub-dimension scores higher in favor of living in the village. There was no statistically significant difference in individual and team athletes' variables (p>0,05). As a result; it has been observed that, the athletes in different sports branches participating in this study have a good level of knowledge about nutrition attitudes. In addition, it has been concluded that the level of IN increases with age; sports age and being a national athlete affect the level of IN positively; the level of IN increases as the family income level increases and the living place in athletes is associated with the IN level. It can be suggested that not only the athletes, but also families, coaches and entourages should give the necessary importance to nutrition knowledge and complete their deficiencies.