Assessment of college students’ awareness and knowledge about conditions relevant to metabolic syndrome

Table 1 Demographics and student characteristics (Means ± SD)

Variables	Females	Males	Total
Number of students	N =174	N =69	N =243
Age (Years)	20.4 ± 1.7*	21.3 ± 2.4*	20.6 ± 2.0
Weight (Kg)	64.1 ± 12.7*	84.2 ± 17.0*	69.8 ± 16.7
Height (cm)	162.9 ± 6.6*	176.0 ± 6.7*	166.8 ± 9.1
BMI (kg/m ² )	23.4 ± 3.9*	26.1 ± 4.9*	24.2 ± 4.4
Body fat (%)	26.8 ± 6.9*	16.6 ± 8.1*	23.9 ± 8.6
Visceral fat score	1.9 ± 1.8*	3.7 ± 4.2*	2.4 ± 2.8
Waist circumference (cm)	81.0 ± 9.7*	91.2 ± 11.0*	83.6 ± 11.0
Major of study (%)
Health science**	58%*	36%*	51%
Non-health science	42%*	64%*	49%
Year in school (%)
1^st-year undergraduate	14%	15%	15%
2^nd-year undergraduate	27%	21%	25%
3^rd-year undergraduate	27%	25%	27%
4^th-year undergraduate	19%	19%	19%
5^th-year undergraduate	13%	19%	15%
Ethnicity (%)
White (Hispanic & Non-hispanic)	91%	86%	89%
Black (Hispanic & Non-hispanic)	9%	10%	10%
Other	0%	4%	1%
Family history of chronic disease (%)***
Heart Disease	10%*	20%*	13%
Diabetes	23%	25%	23%
Hypertension	39%	41%	41%
Cancer	12%	61%	26%
Others****	44%*	21%*	38%
Smoking habit (%)
Non- smoker	93%*	80%*	89%
Current smoker	3.5%	12%	6%
Former smoker	3.5%	9%	5%

*p < 0.05 (between male and female students).
**Health Science majors include: Exercise Science, Health Administration; Health Fitness in Preventive and Rehabilitative Programs, Public Health Education and Health Promotion, School Health Education, Exercise Science, Personal and Community Health, Substance Abuse Education, Prevention, Intervention and Treatment.
***Total% exceeds 100% due to students with a family history of more than one condition.
****Other - includes the “other” family history questions in the data such as family history of overweight, obesity, and high cholesterol.

ISSN: 1758-5996