Diet Quality, Healthy Practices, and Psychosocial Functioning Across School Youth, Students, and Adults in Poland: A...

Background: This study aimed to compare a limited set of predefined diet-, lifestyle-, knowledge-, and psychosocial indicators across school youth, students, and adults in Poland, and to examine their associations with three predefined outcomes: BMI ≥ 25 kg/m², poorer mental well-being, and high stress/overload. Diet quality, daily health-related practices, psychosocial well-being, and stress/overload may co-occur across different life stages, but online survey data require a focused analytical framework to avoid overinterpretation. Methods: This cross-sectional anonymous online survey included 360 respondents: 154 school youth aged 15-19 years, 127 students aged 20-29 years, and 79 adults aged 30 years or older. Dietary assessment was based on the KomPAN questionnaire and included the pro-healthy diet index, non-healthy diet index, and Diet Quality Index. Study-specific scores were used for knowledge, healthy practices, psychosocial well-being, and stress/overload. Analyses were restricted to predefined group comparisons, selected correlations, and three whole-sample adjusted logistic regression models. Results: Adults had the highest BMI and waist/hip circumference, whereas school youth showed the highest non-healthy diet index and more frequent high processed-food intake. Among the knowledge and psychosocial indicators, only obesity knowledge differed significantly between groups, with the highest mean value among students. Stress/overload was inversely associated with psychosocial well-being, and DQI was positively associated with psychosocial well-being after adjustment for age, sex, and group. In adjusted whole-sample models, BMI ≥ 25 kg/m² was positively associated with age and DQI and inversely associated with physical activity frequency and regular meals; the positive DQI-BMI association was interpreted cautiously as potentially reflecting reverse causality, reporting bias, or compensatory dietary modification among respondents with excess body weight. Poorer mental well-being was associated with higher stress/overload and inversely associated with DQI, physical activity frequency, and family meals. High stress/overload was positively associated with highly processed food intake and inversely associated with regular meals. Conclusions: The findings suggest that diet quality, behavioral regularity, and psychosocial burden may be more informative than knowledge alone when describing health-related profiles across age-defined groups. Because the study was cross-sectional, self-reported, anonymous, and based on a modest sample, the results should be interpreted as preliminary and hypothesis-generating rather than causal.