Kontakt 2010, 12(2):174-184 | DOI: 10.32725/kont.2010.024

Selected aspects of the risk behaviour of technical university studentsHealth and Social Sciences

Zdeněk Valjent^1,*, Libor Flemr²

¹ České vysoké učení technické v Praze, Ústav tělesné výchovy a sportu

² Univerzita Karlova v Praze, Fakulta tělesné výchovy a sportu, Psychosociální laboratoř

The target of the study was to examine changes in opinions, attitudes and practices of students in the course of their university studies in terms of certain selected aspects of their risk behaviour. A questionnaire was employed to establish differences between a group of students of the first year (n = 625) and that of students of higher years (n = 581). The results obtained based on the statistical analysis (version 14.0 SPSS) were verified by qualitative methods - deep non-categorized interviews with 32 students and analysis of written texts provided by 27 students.
The results indicate considerable changes in older students: in the number of dinners per week - an increase by 13%; in the occurrence of long-term mental stress - an increase by 16.4%; in the rate of the active locomotor activity - an increase by 16%; and in a reduction in the tolerance to obesity - by 13.4%. Smaller, but still demonstrable changes were observed in the rate of quite sufficient sleep - an increase by 7.7%; in the tolerance to smoking tobacco products - a reduction in the tolerance by 6.0%; in smoking tobacco product such as - a decrease by 5.5%; in opinions concerning the use of drugs - an increase in the tolerance by 7.9%; and in the drug use such as - an increase by 5.7%.
There is a surprising finding, which is quite opposite to most still published opinions that the rate of the sport and physical education activities of students increase in higher years.
The main reasons as mentioned by students are as follows: a) they found a group of students having similar interests for the organization of sport activities; b) many types of sports are expensive and money is more accessible to students in higher years; c) during the study, the students gained a number of kilos exceeding appropriate limits; d) they are capable of better organization of their time; e) they are already aware of fact that sport activities are helpful in terms of their mental as well as health condition.

Keywords: risk behaviour; technical university; rate of the locomotor activity

Received: October 27, 2009; Accepted: May 23, 2010; Prepublished online: June 14, 2010; Published: June 14, 2012  Show citation