Sweet preference and dental caries among Bedouin youth in Israel

Sweet preference and caries prevalence were studied in Bedouin adolescents from two different communities. Twelve-year-old schoolchildren were surveyed in a rural village (30 examinees) and in a more urbanized settlement (30 examinees). Sweet preference was assessed using a free-choice method, while caries was measured by the DMFT index. Results revealed that the "urbanized" examinees preferred higher sugar concentrations and demonstrated higher DMFT scores than their "rural" counterparts. These differences between the two populations were statistically significant. Data were analyzed for correlation between caries prevalence and sweet preference. When each community was analyzed separately, a statistically significant correlation coefficient (Kendall's tau) was found in "rural" but not in "urbanized" children. In pooled data from both communities the correlation was found to be significant, controlling for the effect of the stratifying (community) variable.