A Gender Gap in Unhealthy Lifestyles at Spanish Universities

A new study published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health finds that women at universities in Spain tend to binge drink more than their male peers. The results showed that nearly 84 percent of male students drank alcohol compared to almost 74 percent of women students. But 56.1 percent of women students reported binge drinking compared to 41.3 percent of male students.

Women university students were also more likely than their male counterparts to use tobacco products. But men were more likely than women to use illegal drugs. The study also found that women university students were more likely than men to have a sedentary lifestyle and were twice as likely to have “disturbed eating attitudes.”

The authors conclude that “our survey confirms previous reports where the university population show high prevalence of unhealthy habits. Given these findings, we can establish that there is a need of health-promoting interventions to reduce these problems in the university environment, but fundamentally oriented to women.”

The full article can be accessed here.