Unhealthy food, including fast food and carbonated soft drinks, may have an extremely negative impact on not only physical, but also mental health of adolescents, based on a study conducted at the University of Queensland.
According to Medportal, researchers studied the Global School-based Student Health Survey data from 175,261 adolescents from 64 countries with low, average and high incomes.
Adolescents reported frequency of stress-related sleep disturbance and consumption of carbonated soft drinks and fast foods. Overall, 7.5% of adolescents reported sleep disturbance during the past 12 months. Adolescent males who had fast foods ≥4 days/week had 55% higher odds of reporting sleep disturbance than ≤1 day/week, while the odds were 50% higher in females.
The specialists remind that their findings suggest strong positive associations between carbonated soft drink and fast food intake with stress-related sleep disturbance. Prospective studies are needed to understand the directionality of the relationship.
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