ABSTRACT

The study was designed to determine the food consumption pattern and other lifestyles of adolescents in some selected day secondary schools in Aba south L.G.A Abia state. A total of 308 respondents was selected for the study. The percentage of males (51.9%) was slightly higher than that of the females (48.1%).Most of the respondents live with their parents. Trading was found to be predominant occupation among the respondent fathers (56.5%) and mothers (63.3%). Result revealed that most students consumes food thrice (60.1%) or twice (34.1%) daily. Most (67.2%) of the students also confirmed that they eat enough of each meal. The respondents (34.1%) involved in meal skipping missed either breakfast (18.1%) or lunch (15.9%). Meal skipping was as a result of limited time (19 .2%) and un-affordability (13.3%).Regularly (> 3x weekly) consumption of snacks by most (68.8%) of the respondents was observed in this study. However fruits were poorly (< 3x weekly) consumed by most (69.1%) of the respondents. Favorite foods were preferred to other foods by the students because either they liked them (32.8%) or have become accustomed to them (36.7%).Economic (52.6%) and social (21.1%) factors affected food choices. Cigarette and alcohol consumption was not consumed by (94.2%) respondents and (98.4%) respondents respectively. Results revealed that only (3.2%) of the respondents   do exercise regularly. Majority of the students had either fair (47.1%) or good (45.8%) knowledge of nutrition. Results on nutritional status of the respondents showed that most (79.2%) of the respondents had a normal height for age, some (16.2%) of them were stunted while only a few (4.5%) of them had tall for age. However the boys had more abnormal (stunted 16.9% vs 15.5%; tall for age 5.0% vs 4.1%) height for age status than the girls. Results of respondents BMI for age status revealed that they were more overweight /obese (11.3%) than underweight (9.7%) students. Results for weight for height revealed that they were more overweight/obese (13.9%) than wasting (7.8%).