Fast food and take-away food consumption are associated with different lifestyle characteristics

Background:One of the most prominent characteristics of fast food and take-away food is that it is convenient, meaning that it saves time, it reduces therequired effort for food provisioning and culinary skills are transferred. Studiesthat investigate the unique effect of these factors on dietary behaviours arelacking. Therefore, the present study aimed to examine the associations of time,effort, time spent cooking and cooking skills with fast food and take-away foodconsumption.Methods:Between May and June 2009, a random postal survey was sent out to2323 Swiss households. The response rate was 44% (n= 1017). Spearman rankcorrelations and logistic regression analysis were used to determine the multiplerelationships of fast food and take-away food intake with gender, age, educa-tional level, income, mental effort, physical effort, working status, cooking skillsand time spent cooking.Results:Fast food consumption was found to be associated with gender (males)[odds ratio (OR) = 1.61,P< 0.05], age (40–59 years) (OR = 0.41,P< 0.001),age (‡60 years) (OR = 0.13,P< 0.001), time spent cooking (OR = 0.99;P< 0.01) and cooking skills (OR = 0.81,P< 0.05). Take-away food consump-tion was found to be associated with gender (males) (OR = 1.86,P< 0.01), age(40–59 years) (OR = 0.58,P< 0.01), age (‡60 years) (OR = 0.28,P< 0.001),income (OR = 1.11,P<0.01), education (middle) (OR = 0.65,P< 0.05) andmental effort (OR = 1.25,P< 0.05).Conclusions:Take-away and fast food consumption are behaviours that sharethe same demographic determinants of age and gender, although they areinfluenced by different life style determinants. It is very likely that motivationsrelated to time, effort and cooking are of increasing importance for food deci-sions in our society.