Nutrition and breakfast consumption effects on adolescent health and academic performance

¶ … NUTRITION DURING THE ADOLESCENT STAGE IN PREVENTING FUTURE DISEASES? HOW MIGHT NUTRITION AFFECT GROWTH, DEVELOPMENT, AND LEARNING DURING THE ADOLESCENT STAGE? SOURCES I NEED FOR MY BIBLIOGRAPHY: I REQUIRE THREE (3) PEER-REVIEWED JOURNALS AND TWO CREDIBLE WEBSITES.

The importance of nutrients during adolescence

Adolescents in the contemporary society find it difficult to follow a strict set of rules and most are inclined to pay little to no attention to their health. Nutrition is a delicate topic when considering adolescents because many consider that their health status is not going to change in the future. The fact that overweight adolescents have come to represent an important problem in the present contributes to the gravity of this situation and it is thus essential for teenagers to have a complex understanding of the concept of nutrition. Nutrition is important when considering learning and behavior, this meaning that the future of society partly rests on people's perception of the issue.

Breakfast is an important step in teaching adolescents that their lives depend on how they take care of themselves in the present. The fact that optimal nutrition is a significant issue for students in general can actually be combated by installing a program meant to instruct them with regard to breakfast eating as a part of their success. According to a research performed by Murphy (29), "substantive breakfast skippers were significantly more likely to be female (56.1%) than were non-breakfast skippers (50.9%). Substantive breakfast skippers were significantly older (9.9) and from higher grades (4.3) than non-breakfast skippers (9.8 & 4.2 respectively)." This makes it possible for people to understand that age and gender play an important role when considering the degree to which particular adolescents express interest in breakfast.

Individuals who skip breakfast are less likely to be in a perfect health condition, more likely to be overweight, and have a higher level of tardiness. High quality nutrients consumed during breakfast have a positive effect on adolescents by increasing their cognitive abilities (Hasz & Lamport 64). Protein utilization is very important during this stage in life and by eating these proteins in the morning adolescents are enabled to function better through the day, and, as a consequence, to obtain better results in their adult lives (Rickert 9).

Adolescents in poor rural communities are predisposed to getting poor nutrition partly because of their financial condition and partly because they are not educated with regard to the importance of nutrition. Information regarding the condition of these individuals is limited especially because the masses tend to ignore them. Achieving optimal growth is a crucial step when considering these people and girls are a particularly important topic because they need to be provided with the resources that they need in order to give birth to healthy babies in their adult lives (Kusuma 2).