Correlates of adherence to a posteriori derived dietary patterns of an Italian sample of adults

Abstract There is emerging evidence that the Italian population is switching away from the traditional Mediterranean dietary pattern towards unhealthy eating habits. We derived adults’ dietary patterns (DP) using a principal component analysis (PCA) on food groups intake of a representative sample of the Italian population (INRAN-SCAI 2005-2006), and correlated diet adherence scores with sociodemographic characteristics through multivariable linear regressions. After PCA, “High-fat”, “Western”, “Health-conscious”, “Italian, traditional” and “Junk, out of meal” DPs were retained. Female gender (β = 0.5103; p