Perception and behavior of university students in the face of obesity, overweight and eating habits

Abstract

At present obesity is a universal disease, the World Health Organization (WHO) considers it a “global epidemic” and affirms that it is the second cause of risk of preventable death in the world, at the national level the number of people who acquire chronic degenerative diseases derived from overweight and obesity has also been increasing, as has the public cost to maintain treatments or absenteeism from work that these diseases generate in the economically active population.

Experts affirm that this is not a problem that has an easy or quick solution, since multiple factors intervene in obesity such as genetics and its biological components, but also aspects such as lifestyle, social or cultural factors and that there are also many interests involved that intervene to achieve radical change.

Faced with this problem, some experts propose that change must occur from adolescence and youth since they will be the ones who will give life to the next generation, therefore, by intervening in this stage, it seeks to promote that their children are conceived in healthy organisms and keep them that way throughout life to achieve a comprehensive change in the population. For this reason, this work sought to know in the first instance the perception of the university students of the Faculty of Higher Studies Zaragoza campus I and II, regarding obesity, overweight and eating habits through their self-report, through a survey of multiple choice that allowed to identify, in a descriptive way, the absence of clear and truthful information that young people have on the subject, which shows that it does not matter how many articles are made about this problem, if they fail to raise awareness among the population and above all that they represent a guide towards the actions that must be taken to prevent or control it.