Nutrition-Exercise Behaviours and Heart Health: A Study on Secondary School Students

Background and Aims: According to World Health Organization statistics, Cardiovascular Diseases (CVD) is the leading cause of death in the world and accounts for 30% of all deaths. In Turkey, this rate is 47%. Health-related attitudes and behaviors that are effective in the formation of CVDs that show symptoms in adulthood begin to develop in childhood. This research was conducted to evaluate the relationship between secondary school students' heart health promotion attitudes and nutrition-exercise behaviors. Methods The research was conducted as a descriptive-cross-sectional and correlation-seeking type study. Research data were collected using the “Sociodemographic Data Collection Form, “Children’s Cardiovascular Health Promotion Attitude Scale”and “Nutrition-Exercise Behavior Scale”. Within the scope of the research, 395 data were collected, Descriptive statistical methods (number, percentage, min-max values, mean, standard deviation) were used when evaluating the data. Results 51.8% of the students are girls, 35.3% are 12 years old, and 26.1% are 13 years old. Children's Cardiovascular Health Promotion Attitude Scale mean score was 27.13 ± 5.44; 6.86 ± 1.98 for Exercise Dimension; 7.98 ± 2.23 for Nutrition Dimension; It was calculated as 5.40 ± 1.79 for the Cigarette Dimension and 6.88 ± 2.10 for the Stress Control Dimension. Nutrition-Exercise Behavior Scale mean scores were 30.32 ± 9.14 for the Psychologically Dependent Eating Behavior subscale; 47.78 ± 10.14 for the Healthy Nutrition Exercise Behavior sub-dimension; 38.15 ± 7.64 for the Unhealthy Nutrition Exercise Behavior subscale; For the Meal Pattern sub-dimension, it was calculated as 21.35 ± 4.50. Conclusions While unhealthy nutrition, exercise behavior and psychologically dependent eating behavior positively affect attitude scores; healthy eating behavior and meal patterns negatively affect the scores.