Lifestyle-related behaviour: an analysis of gender differences in the Czech Republic

• Thesis title in Czech: Vliv životního stylu na chování obyvatel: genderové rozdíly v České republice
• Thesis title in English: Lifestyle-related behaviour: an analysis of gender differences in the Czech Republic
• Key words: životní styl, genderové rozdíly, Česká republika, analýza hlavních komponent
• English key words: lifestyle, gender differences, Czech Republic, principal component analysis
• Academic year of topic announcement: 2016/2017
• Thesis type: Bachelor's thesis
• Thesis language: angličtina
• Department: Institute of Economic Studies (23-IES)
• Supervisor: PhDr. Mgr. Jana Votápková, Ph.D.
• Author: hidden - assigned by the advisor
• Date of registration: 13.06.2017
• Date of assignment: 13.06.2017
• Date and time of defence: 12.06.2018 09:00
• Venue of defence: Opletalova - Opletalova 26, O206, Opletalova - místn. č. 206
• Date of electronic submission: 10.05.2018
• Date of proceeded defence: 12.06.2018
• Opponents: Mgr. Jindřich Matoušek, Ph.D.

References

• Von Bothmer, M. I. K. and Fridlund, B. (2005), Gender differences in health habits and in motivation for a healthy lifestyle among Swedish university students. Nursing & Health Sciences, 7: 107–118.
• Denton, M. and Walters, V. (1999), Gender differences in structural and behavioural determinants of health: an analysis of the social production of health. Social science & medicine, 48: 1221-1235.
• Denton, M., Prus, S. and Walters, V. (2004), Gender differences in health: a Canadian study of the psychosocial, structural and behavioural determinants of health. Social science & medicine, 58: 2585-2600.
• McDonough, P., Walters, V. (2001), Gender and health: reassessing petterns and explanations. Social Science & Medicine, 52: 547-559.
• Macintyre, S., Hunt, K. and Sweeting H. (1996), Gender differences in health: are things really as simple as they seem? Social Science & Medicine, 42: 617-624.
• Steptoe, A. and Wardle, J. (2001), Health behaviour, risk awareness and emotional well-being in students from Eastern Europe and Western Europe. Social science & medicin, 53: 1621-1630
• Haase, A., Steptoe, A., Sallis, JF. and Wardle J. (2004), Leisure-time physical activity in university students from 23 countries – associations with health beliefs, risk awareness, and national economic development. Prev. Med., 39: 182-190

Preliminary scope of work in English

Research question and motivation
Besides socioeconomic determinants and physical environment, lifestyle is one of the major determinants of health. As Von Bothmer and Fridlund (2005) claim in their paper concerning the gender-based health habits of Swedish university students, people’s approach to their health is found to be a fine predictor of mortality. Self-rated health has a strong predictive power. Previous studies from the United States demonstrate that women care more about their diet (they are more interested in nutrition) but they are also more stressed than men. On the other hand, men are not that concerned with nutrition and tend to consume more alcohol, but at the same time they are likely to do more exercise.
In the past decades, the demand for healthy products and wellness expanded - it barely existed 30 years ago. To be able to target health education programs and promotions it is necessary to know people’s health-related habits.
In this bachelor thesis, my objective will be to investigate whether there are any gender differences in health-related habits of Czech people. I will compare their overall approach both to healthy lifestyle and to individual habits. I assume that women will show a higher tendency to maintain a healthy lifestyle.

Contribution
Both Czech and international studies on lifestyle approach were focused mainly on children and adolescents. Von Bothmer and Fridlund (2005) focused on Swedish university students, Steptoe and Wardle (2001) compared Western and Eastern Europe students without discussing gender differences, and Haase et al. (2004) investigated gender differences but only regarding leisure time physical activities. I will try to add the missing research and I will focus on lifestyle-related behaviour of all cohorts, emphasising differences between genders in the Czech Republic.

Methodology
I will use data from the World Health Survey done by the World Health Organization in 2003 in the Czech Republic. The data were collected in face-to-face interviews and contain information about people´s health habits, such as smoking, alcohol consumption etc. In addition, they also contain socio-demographic characteristics.
The descriptive part will compare women’s and men’s approach to individual habits which include daily consumption of fruit and vegetables, number of cigarettes smoked, quantity of alcohol consumed, attitude to physical activity and stress.
A logit regression will be used to test the effects of gender on individual habits econometrically. Additionally, other socio-demographic variables will be controlled for. These include age, marital status, education, job, weight, height etc.
Since the overall lifestyle cannot be observed directly, individual habits will then be weighted using a principal component analysis and a single lifestyle variable will be obtained. An additional logit regression on the obtained composite variable will be carried out.