Dietary Patterns, Food-Group Profiles, and Nutritional Characteristics in a Diverse Cohort of Young Adults Attending a UK University (2016)

Background/Objectives: Whole-diet patterns in geographically diverse university populations remain insufficiently characterised. We examined food-group consumption and dietary patterns according to sex and geographical background in a historical UK university cohort.

Methods

This cross-sectional analysis included 111 students assessed at De Montfort University, Leicester, in early 2016. Habitual intake was assessed using an expanded, adapted EPIC-Norfolk food-frequency questionnaire. Fifteen food groups were evaluated using principal component analysis after log1p transformation and standardisation; between-group comparisons were adjusted for relevant covariates and subjected to Benjamini–Hochberg false-discovery-rate correction.

Results

The participants had a mean age of 20.4 ± 1.2 years, and 70.3% were female. Three patterns—Plant-rich, Animal-source foods, and Energy-dense/discretionary—explained 46.25% of the variance, compared with 35.24% for the two-component alternative. Parallel analysis supported retention of three components; bootstrap results favoured their overall reproducibility but indicated substantial uncertainty in individual food-group loadings. Males had lower adjusted Plant-rich scores than females (−0.43 SD, 95% CI −0.76 to −0.10; q = 0.04). Plant-rich and Animal-source foods scores differed by geographical background (q = 0.006 for both global tests), whereas the Energy-dense/discretionary pattern did not.