Meal Skipping in Young Adults - Research Proposal Example

Systemic Review Correlates of Meal Skipping in Young Adults Name Student ID Number Meal skipping is a health hazard that all health, as well as nutritional practitioners, are completely against for it weakens the immune system and brings along it some other numerous adverse effects. Along this fact is that the body learns to adapt to the survivor's diet for the sake of utilizing the energy provision that is irregular due to the unpredicted frequency of meals. However, the literature available on this subject does not adequately cover the contentious issues that cause as well as the effects of the skipping of meals. This systemic review seeks to identify a gap in the available literature that addresses the issue of correlates skipping meals. Skipping meals is therefore not well addressed by the existing literature. The research question here is "Is there a problem of skipping of meals in young adults well addressed by the existing literatures?" Research Design The methods and protocols used for the study were first justified for their ease of use with the reporting items. There was first the search strategy and the eligibility criteria used to obtain the best response that could give as clear data as possible. The search strategy involved a comprehensive search to try and get all the available literatures that have been written surrounding the meal skipping issues. For purposes of being clear enough, the researchers limited themselves to study only humans. The literatures were isolated from those published since the days of 1979, 1980’s up to this date. Ladies interviewed also disclosed some information about their counterparts who had the habit of skipping meals in these books and journals and also, some men were interviewed, and they were asked to reveal the same. However, women were found to be more responsive. However, there were some criteria that were being used for literature to qualify to be included in the article. The article must have met the following criteria: The research must have been focused on young people in the age bracket of 18-30. Any journal or book that included the other ages that had been left out by the brackets was not considered. The research must have been an original one whereby it is the researchers who went to the field to gather information and write their work in the literature. The language used must have been only English for purposes of getting to read and understand the information contained therein easily. The study must have been randomized as much as possible There was a reported measure of meal skipping In selecting the literature, the articles that were excluded from the study were those that which failed to meet the eligibility criteria. The data was therefore extracted and synthesized whereby the spreadsheet that was used was the electronic one. The information that was much sought after by the reviewers included the date, year, how one understood the concept of skipping of meals and the how often the skipping was done. A second reviewer also scrutinized the spreadsheet for accuracy. After that there was a quality assessment to make sure that there was no risk of any sort of bias that could corrupt the integrity of the information. Also, the study characteristics considered were imperative to the study was conducted in the United States, Nigeria, Ghana, Croatia, UAE, and Saudi Arabia among others so as to do a complete research. Some had females as their major respondents while others had males. Still, some had both genders (Keski-Rahkonen, Anna et al., 842). The definition of skipping of meals was given as failure to take one's meals as per the assessment method of the diet for the respondents. Characteristics of the study were questions that asked on whether a responded skipped meals, the frequency of it, followed by the correlates of skipping meals. In the findings, there was a report of breakfast skipping as well as lunch and supper skipping, but breakfast skipping was more reported with 88.5% of those interviewed responding that they had indeed skipped. The lunch skipping was reported in 55% of the respondents while skipping of dinner was reported in the 47% of those interviewed. The factors that caused meal skipping and the behavior were analyzed using the chi-square, one way ANOVA as well as other statistical methods such as the linear and logistic ones. Some potential correlates were also ranked against their correlates that skipped meals. There was the consideration of sex, body mass index, and menstrual factors among others. Sex was not a determinant factor with some of the two reports showing that there was no considerable distinction in meal skipping observed in the two groups of gender. In fact, two of the researchers found that there was no difference in meal skipping among the females and males. However, however, the reports found that the skipping of breakfast in males was more frequent than it is in females. Also, some two studies found that there was a tendency of skipping lunch and supper among males than it is for females. Age is an association that exists between age and skipping of breakfast among the less aged. This is because the studies found that there was some increased tendency among the age bracket 15-20 years as compared to the bracket of 24-28 years. Besides, ethnicity was also a significant factor that was found to be associated with skipping of meals. This was found among the Caucasians whereby the people are more likely to skip meals than any other ethnic group. Psychological health is also a factor that cannot be ignored as the psychological factors such as depression affect adversely on the meal taking habits. In fact, those who had stress related health issues were more likely to have one meal in a day or sometimes they do not take any. It is due to this that factor that it was drawn that there was a significant relationship to skipping of meals. Also, those who had increased satisfaction of the body were found to have a less tendency to skipping of meals. In all the factors that contributed to meal skipping, time was the largest single contributor. This is because the respondents said that they lacked time to organize and have their meals frequently as it is supposed to be. Weight control also was another factor with those intending to lose weight not taking food and eating only snacks to fulfill their physical requirements for food for energy (Seymour et al., 23). The factor that followed was the availability of money with many saying that they did not have money and that is why they skipped their meals in order to save. The 6% that was identified was of mixed genders so there was no specific gender which was adversely affected by economic orders. Dietary habits also were shaped by religion with the Muslim religion leading in the skipping of meals, especially during the Ramadhan period. They skip their meals for an entire month, eating only the supper and neglecting the importance of breakfast and supper. To make matters worse, they even took no water during the period. Discussion The majority of the studies which were 33 in number raised concerns over time to prepare meals as people lacked the wanted time. This called for the preparation of short time meals which could take less to prepare, and this was given as the biggest reason as to why most of the respondents skipped breakfast. Also, when the females take breakfast, they think that they are done, and this makes them not to take lunch or dinner. They, therefore, end up becoming the sex group which was more frequent in skipping of meals. Lunch and supper as compared to males. In the men, it is evident from the two studies that found significant differences that they are more frequent to skip breakfast. Further Research Suggestions There are some discrepancies in the definition of meal skipping; therefore, the study has identified some more gaps tight invites researchers to have a proper definition of meal skipping. The measurements that the researchers used to identify meal skipping are not considerable enough. This, therefore, calls for more literature to come up with standards of quantifying the same. The domains that were reported are just within intrapersonal domains, and there is still some room for research outside these domains (Niemeier, Heather et al., 845). There were also some more rooms left as the research only concentrated on the young adults. In the future research, more groups of the population should also be included in order to get a more comprehensive study. Conclusions The research is about meal skipping habits observed in populations of young adults, and they also are in consistency with the facts of previous researchers that skipping of breakfast was more in this age group. Researchers are also more consistent with these findings that the males are more likely to skip their breakfast as their female counterparts skip the lunch and supper meals. From this study, it is evident that the skipping of meals is not sufficiently addressed in the existing literature. Works Cited Keski-Rahkonen, Anna, et al. "Breakfast skipping and health-compromising behaviors in adolescents and adults." European journal of clinical nutrition 57.7 (2003): 842. Niemeier, Heather M., et al. "Fast food consumption and breakfast skipping: predictors of weight gain from adolescence to adulthood in a nationally representative sample." Journal of adolescent Health 39.6 (2006): 842-849. Seymour, Michele, Sharon L. Hoerr, and Ya-Li Huang. "Inappropriate dieting behaviors and related lifestyle factors in young adults: Are college students different?." Journal of Nutrition Education 29.1 (1997): 21-26. Read More