Effects of COVID-19 Home Confinement on Eating Behaviour and Physical Activity: Results of the ECLB-COVID19 International Online Survey

  1. Achraf Ammar
  2. Michael Brach
  3. Khaled Trabelsi
  4. Hamdi Chtourou
  5. Omar Boukhris
  6. Liwa Masmoudi
  7. Bassem Bouaziz
  8. Ellen Bentlage
  9. Daniella How
  10. Mona Ahmed
  11. Patrick Müller
  12. Notger Müller
  13. Asma Aloui
  14. Omar Hammouda
  15. Laisa Paineiras-Domingos
  16. Annemarie Braakman-Jansen
  17. Christian Wrede
  18. Sofia Bastoni
  19. Carlos Pernambuco
  20. Leonardo Mataruna
  21. Morteza Taheri
  22. Khadijeh Irandoust
  23. Aïmen Khacharem
  24. Nicola Bragazzi
  25. Karim Chamari
  26. Jordan Glenn
  27. Nicholas Bott
  28. Faiez Gargouri
  29. Lotfi Chaari
  30. Hadj Batatia
  31. Gamal Ali
  32. Osama Abdelkarim
  33. Mohamed Jarraya
  34. Kais El Abed
  35. Nizar Souissi
  36. Lisette Van Gemert-Pijnen
  37. Bryan Riemann
  38. Laurel Riemann
  39. Wassim Moalla
  40. Jonathan Gómez-Raja
  41. Monique Epstein
  42. Robbert Sanderman
  43. Sebastian Schulz
  44. Achim Jerg
  45. Ramzi Al-Horani
  46. Taiysir Mansi
  47. Mohamed Jmail
  48. Fernando Barbosa
  49. Fernando Ferreira-Santos
  50. Boštjan Šimunič
  51. Rado Pišot
  52. Andrea Gaggioli
  53. Stephen Bailey
  54. Jürgen Steinacker
  55. Tarak Driss
  56. Anita Hoekelmann
  57. On Behalf of the ECLB-COVID19 Consortium

Reviewed by

Read the full article See related articles

Listed in

Log in to save this article

Abstract

Background: Public health recommendations and governmental measures during the COVID-19 pandemic have resulted in numerous restrictions on daily living including social distancing, isolation and home confinement. While these measures are imperative to abate the spreading of COVID-19, the impact of these restrictions on health behaviours and lifestyles at home is undefined. Therefore, an international online survey was launched in April 2020, in seven languages, to elucidate the behavioural and lifestyle consequences of COVID-19 restrictions. This report presents the results from the first thousand responders on physical activity (PA) and nutrition behaviours. Methods: Following a structured review of the literature, the “Effects of home Confinement on multiple Lifestyle Behaviours during the COVID-19 outbreak (ECLB-COVID19)” Electronic survey was designed by a steering group of multidisciplinary scientists and academics. The survey was uploaded and shared on the Google online survey platform. Thirty-five research organisations from Europe, North-Africa, Western Asia and the Americas promoted the survey in English, German, French, Arabic, Spanish, Portuguese and Slovenian languages. Questions were presented in a differential format, with questions related to responses “before” and “during” confinement conditions. Results: 1047 replies (54% women) from Asia (36%), Africa (40%), Europe (21%) and other (3%) were included in the analysis. The COVID-19 home confinement had a negative effect on all PA intensity levels (vigorous, moderate, walking and overall). Additionally, daily sitting time increased from 5 to 8 h per day. Food consumption and meal patterns (the type of food, eating out of control, snacks between meals, number of main meals) were more unhealthy during confinement, with only alcohol binge drinking decreasing significantly. Conclusion: While isolation is a necessary measure to protect public health, results indicate that it alters physical activity and eating behaviours in a health compromising direction. A more detailed analysis of survey data will allow for a segregation of these responses in different age groups, countries and other subgroups, which will help develop interventions to mitigate the negative lifestyle behaviours that have manifested during the COVID-19 confinement.

Article activity feed

  1. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2020.05.04.20072447: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    Institutional Review Board StatementConsent: The protocol and the consent form were fully approved (identification code: 62/20) by the Otto von Guericke University Ethics Committee.
    IRB: The protocol and the consent form were fully approved (identification code: 62/20) by the Otto von Guericke University Ethics Committee.
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.

    Table 2: Resources

    No key resources detected.

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: An explicit section about the limitations of the techniques employed in this study was not found. We encourage authors to address study limitations.

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.

    Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.

    Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.

    Results from rtransparent:
    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • No protocol registration statement was detected.

    About SciScore

    SciScore is an automated tool that is designed to assist expert reviewers by finding and presenting formulaic information scattered throughout a paper in a standard, easy to digest format. SciScore checks for the presence and correctness of RRIDs (research resource identifiers), and for rigor criteria such as sex and investigator blinding. For details on the theoretical underpinning of rigor criteria and the tools shown here, including references cited, please follow this link.

  2. Version published to 10.3390/nu12061583
  3. Version published to 10.1101/2020.05.04.20072447v1 on medRxiv