CHAPTER 4: DATA PRESENTATION, ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION
4.4 Factors that influence college students’ choice of food consumption patterns
4.4.8 Meal planning
Meal planning is a crucial exercise as it allows for the inclusion of recommended nutrient requirements per day. Table 4.25 shows students percentages of students who plan and those who did not.
Table 4.26 Meal planning (n=100)
Meal planning Frequency Percentage
Yes 6 6 %
No 94 94 %
Total 100 100%
The majority of the students comprising 94% were not involved in the planning of the meals for reasons such as having food provided by the college and for others, it is because they had no nutrition knowledge. Only 6% planned their meals. This suggests that the majority of the students consumed unplanned meals which, in turn, affect academic performance.
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When interviewing students on how they plan their meals, most of them indicated that did not plan because of various reasons such as lack of knowledge of doing so, while resident student indicated that the college provides them with food but do not involve them in the planning of their own meals. On being questioned on how they plan meals for the students, both cooks indicated that they did not systematically plan meals for the students. This confirmed the resultant fixed unplanned meals as they just followed the menu whose initiator they were not even sure of. This means that the college gave students unplanned meals, thus resulting in consumption of unbalanced diets. When asked who planned the menu, one cook said:
…according to what I found here I found them already planned a a a the menu for the students. So we just continued with the one which was already there, but there are few changes here and there.
Regarding the planning and selection of foodstuffs according to whether they are balanced or not, both cooks who participated in the study argued that their planning was inconsistent and guided by available funds rather than the nutritive value of the meals for the students. The cooks confirmed insufficient budget for meals owing to the amount of funds paid by the students towards their meals.
One of the cooks expressed that:
It‟s really a challenging task to plan meals for a large group of people with limited funds. As much as we would have loved to plan the meals in such a way that the meals provide all the necessary nutrients we can‟t do that because students are just paying $175 for the whole term and get 3 meals per day. So we are just considering funds available and we buy what is cheap. Because if you calculate you would find that its $1.94 per day divided by 3 meals. And where have you seen an adult having food for such an amount…
These findings confirm the haphazard dietary patterns that the students adopted, which they themselves also reported during the 24 hour dietary recall interviews. The students did not plan their meals which compromised on their nutrient intake.
Worthington-Roberts and Williams (2000:247) state that it is very important to plan meals in advance in order to take note of individual dietary needs and the
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recommended daily allowances. By implication, students‟ dietary needs were not considered.
In order to establish why students were not involved in the planning of their meals, the following responses were given in Table 4.27.
Table 4.27 Reasons for not being involved in meal planning (n=100)
Reason Frequency Percentage
Food is provided by the college and they do not involve us in the planning of our meals
50 50 %
I do not plan because I just cook what is there on that particular day.
36 36%
I do not plan because I do not know how to do it. 14 14%
Total 100 100%
All the students who resided in college indicated that the college planned for them and they did not have any input on the planning of the menu. The other 36% did not plan because they would only cook what was available while 14% indicated that they did not plan because they had no knowledge of doing that. The college did not involve a dietician because as specialist they would assist in coming up with balanced diets for the students.
In concurrence with questionnaire data above interview data from the resident students revealed that the students did not choose foods personally as they are prescribed by the college. They also intimated that since college plans and prescribes the meals for them they did not plan which foods to select during meals. By implication, students thus adopt a fixed uptake of food staffs institutionally prescribed for and imposed on them regardless of whether they are balanced or not. To further illustrate one of the sub themes produced by the researcher that food choice is depended on institutionally prescribed menus and whatever food is available.
Interview results however, showed that resident students supplemented food they received from the college as and when they had funds for purchase of foodstuffs.
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Above this, thematic findings confirm the dimension of unplanned and unfixed supplementary food consumption that resident students adopt in order to survive in college. Several students stated that what determined their choice of food was the amount of funds they possessed at any given time and they would purchase the available convenient foods such as bread and fizzy drinks as well. Most of the participates confessed that they did not bother about the nutritive value of the food they bought to supplement their college provided meals but consumed which ever food stuffs came their way just to keep going hence, the adoption of their dietary patterns. The resident students adopted unplanned food consumption patterns befitting a balanced diet.
These results suggest poor nutritional practices as the services of a dietician were supposed to have been sought. According to Akbaraly, Singh-Manoux, Marmot and Brunner, (200:148) dieticians work with individuals, groups, workplaces and media to provide dietary advice for healthy living. In America any institution that provides food to its clients, be it students in a college or hospital, the services of a dietician or nutritionist should be sought. They have the duty of identifying nutrition problems and assessing the nutritional status of students in a college setting. When they work in a college or university they are the ones who develop diet plans, manage cost effective food production operation, provide expertise in nutrition, as well as promote health and prevent disease. In Zimbabwe and other African countries, institutions can run their cafeterias without a dietician or a nutritionist placing the clients at risk of wrong food consumption patterns ending up malnourishing them. Dieticians would oversee meal preparation and serving to make sure dietary needs and food safety regulations are being met.