Abstract
The objectives o f this study were to assess the knowledge and belief regarding probiotics and determine factors associated with their consumption among Jordanian college students. A total o f1000 students (58.8% females and 41.2% males) were interviewed using a cross sectional study. Each student was asked to complete a questionnaire including socio-demographic data and took a probiotic knowledge test. The results obtained showed that 11.7% o fstudents had heard o fprobiotics, but only 7.0% correctly knew what probiotics were. Probiotic knowledge among students was significantly correlated with gender, marital status and the students major with females being more knowledgeable than males. Students who had a higher knowledge score were significantly more willing to try probiotic products when they were recommended (p< 0.05). It is important that the informations about healthenhancing foods translated into simple, understandable and convincing messages that the consumer can realize in order to overcome the lack o fknowledge aboutprobiotic among educated consumers such as university students. Therefore, there is a need fo r health specialists to spend extra effort to educate students about the nature o fprobiotics and their health benefits which in turn could be used as prevention toolfor the occurrence o f many diseases.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 77-86 |
Number of pages | 10 |
Journal | International Journal of Probiotics and Prebiotics |
Volume | 9 |
Issue number | 3 |
Publication status | Published - Jan 1 2014 |
Externally published | Yes |
Keywords
- Knowledge
- Probiotics
- Student
- Survey
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Food Animals
- Applied Microbiology and Biotechnology
- Nutrition and Dietetics
- Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health