Unhealthy food in relation to posttraumatic stress symptoms among adolescents

• Nutritional habbits probably depend on mental health state.
• Unhealthy food and beverages consumption is associated with posttraumatic stress symptoms among adolescents.
• Lifetime traumatic experiences in everyday life, family and school are associated with posttraumatic stress symptoms.
• Physical inactivity and smoking are associated with posttraumatic stress symptoms.
• Sense of coherence mediates the associations between unhealthy food consumption and posttraumatic stress symptoms.

The linkage between mood states and unhealthy food consumption has been under investigation in the recent years. This study aimed to evaluate the associations between posttraumatic stress (PTS) symptoms after lifetime traumatic experiences and daily unhealthy food consumption among adolescents, taking into account the possible effects of physical inactivity, smoking, and a sense of coherence. A self-administered questionnaire measured symptoms of PTS, lifetime traumatic experiences, food frequency scale, sense of coherence scale in a representative sample of eighth grade pupils of the Kaunas, Lithuania, secondary schools (N = 1747; 49.3% girls and 50.7% boys). In the logistic regression models, all lifetime traumatic events were associated with PTS symptoms, as well as were unhealthy foods, (including light alcoholic drinks, spirits, soft and energy drinks, flavored milk, coffee, fast food, chips and salty snacks, frozen processed foods; excluding sweet snacks, biscuits and pastries) and sense of coherence weakened the strength of the associations. However, physical inactivity and smoking showed no mediating effect for the majority of unhealthy foods. In conclusion, we found that intervention and preventive programs on PTS symptoms may be beneficial while dealing with behavioral problems (unhealthy diet, smoking, alcohol, physical inactivity) among adolescents.