Social and nutritional perspectives on dietary changes in the life course: from adolescence to adulthood

Eating habits are influenced by multiple factors from an individual's environment and their movement through the life course. This longitudinal dietary study provided quantitative evidence of dietary change and investigated factors influencing dietary change from adolescence to adulthood. Dietary data, using food diaries, were obtained in 1980 and 2000 from the same 198 respondents aged 11.6 and 32.5 years, in Northumberland, North East England. Two questionnaires were completed in 2000. Foods consumed were assigned to one of the five food groups from The Balance of Good Health and expressed as percentage contribution to total food weight. Combining the quantitative dietary data and descriptive statistics with the qualitative data allowed the identification of relationships between the participant's perceptions of, and attributions for, change in eating behaviour and actual change over 20 years. Change in food intake between adolescence and adulthood related to life-course events and trajectories. Respondents had accurate perceptions regarding the direction of their dietary change over 20 years. Parents, partners and children were perceived to have influenced dietary change. Other key influences were work, limitations on time and awareness of nutrition and health. Demographic factors and questionnaire responses were associated with the degree of change in intake of the five food groups. Gender differences existed in both measured dietary changes and attributions for such changes. These findings help to explain the complex process of dietary change from adolescence to adulthood. The combination of methodologies from both nutritional and social sciences adds breadth and depth to the findings