J Nutr Health.  2019 Apr;52(2):119-128. 10.4163/jnh.2019.52.2.119.

The influence of breakfast on the academic performance of school-age adolescents: systematic review

• Jeong EY

• KMID: 2444935
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.4163/jnh.2019.52.2.119

Abstract

PURPOSE
This review article provides an overview of the importance of breakfast by examining the relationship between breakfast and academic achievement including the papers published in Korean.
METHODS
This study searched a total of six domestic and international databases. The main search words for searching the database were "˜breakfast,'"˜morning meal,'"˜adolescent,'"˜teen or teenage,'"˜children' and "˜academic performance,' and used search operators when available such as "˜breakfast AND adolescent AND academic performance'.
RESULTS
We searched a total of 274 studies through six databases and included a total of 15 primary studies in which 12 studies were cross-sectional and three were cohort studies. Since a quantitative integration of the primary studies was difficult to achieve such as performing a meta-analysis, this study performed a descriptive analysis of all the 15 studies and the results have shown that eating breakfast has a significant effect on academic achievement. In other words, students who regularly had breakfast showed more than twice the academic performance compared to those who did not have breakfast, and even though the math scores of students who had breakfast were statistically significantly higher, none of the study results inferred the reason.
CONCLUSION
This study showed the importance of eating breakfast during adolescence by presenting that academic achievement increases with regular or more frequent habits of eating breakfast.

Keyword

breakfast; adolescent; academic performance; systematic review

MeSH Terms

Adolescent*
Breakfast*
Cohort Studies
Eating
Humans

Figure

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  Fig. 1 Flow diagram of the study selection process

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