Weight Gain in College Students - Health Channel

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Weight Gain in College Students |

Terry Ochoa, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, explains there are some reasons why students gain weight. Some of them are lack of sleep, as a consequence of them having time management issues; college life, which means having classes in different hours through the week; and not eating as well, among others.

“We also have them picking comfort foods, because they are anxious or stressed,” she says and points out alcohol and high sugar drinks are also reasons.

Transcript

So we’ve heard a lot that stress can cause weight gain so what is it about that transition for kids that has them put on those extra 10 15 pounds let’s take a look at a couple of reasons that this could be happening and maybe you can help us kind of guide through these these tips reasons well that top one on the left you that you see about the lack of sleep we know that they have time management issues they want to get everything in college life for example you don’t have the same schedules that you did when you were in high school there’s a set schedule these students may be in a class on Mondays at 3 p.m. the next ones at 8 p.m. and then on Tuesday they’d have a class at 8 a.m. then the next day they may not have a class so their schedule is really off so time management becomes an issue then we also have the issue of not eating as well they’re picking the wrong foods they have this freedom to go into that cafeteria and pick whatever they want never have to look at another green orange or purple color in their food again so that might be very enticing to them we also have them picking comfort foods you know if they’re anxious or stressed sometimes they go to food for that and if they see something that reminds them at home they may get nostalgic like that mac and cheese and maybe mom makes the best so we have that there’s also that high stress of staying up and studying and cramming so we have that issue where the student just will start staying up all the way through the night and then going straight to class there’s evidence suggesting that that’s not a good thing they’re not going to remember the information as well as if they would have gotten a good night’s sleep and then of course it’s those drinks we have the alcohol and the high sugar content drinks you’re going to see I’ve got one to show right now and I think will will be good for you to see as far as how many calories and where those calories from its empty calories you

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