title: The Mediating Role of Mental Health in the Relations between Dietary Behaviors and General Health: A Cross-sectional Study.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The aim of this study is to find a pathway to explaining the relations between dietary behaviors with mental health and psychological functioning.
  
  
  METHODS
  This cross-sectional study contains 4763 participants from the employees of Isfahan University of Medical Sciences. In this study, four questionnaires were administered which were provided as follows: demographic characteristics, 21-item dietary behaviors questionnaire, Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale questionnaire, and 12-item General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12). We started the analysis with the structural equation modeling (SEM) model with 4 unobserved latent and 16 observed variables.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The results show that the regression coefficient (standard error) of diet behavior on mental health and mental health on GHQ were - 1 (0.37) and 0.02 (0.01) with theirPvalues as 0.007 and 0.01, respectively. For this model, the estimated root mean square error of approximation is 0.062 with 90% confidence interval of (0.060-0.065). In addition, the comparative fit indices (CFIs) were as 0.866 for incremental fit index and 0.866 for CFI. All these indices represent fairly good fit of the model to the data.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  We can conclude that "lower scores on diet behavior - higher scores on mental health problems" and "higher mean scores in depression and/or anxiety - higher scores in GHQ domains." The SEM results showed that dietary behaviors have significance related to depression and/or anxiety and general health status.
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Public Health Faculty, Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, Isfahan, Iran.
authors.forename: Shahrzad
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Nematollahi
authors.affiliation: Integrative Functional Gastroenterology Research Center, Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, Isfahan, Iran.
authors.forename: Ammar Hassanzadeh
authors.initials: AH
authors.lastname: Keshteli
authors.affiliation: Department of Community Nutrition, School of Nutrition and Food Science, Food Security Research Center, Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, Isfahan, Iran.
authors.forename: Ahmad
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Esmaillzadeh
authors.affiliation: Psychosomatic Research Center, Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, Isfahan, Iran.
authors.forename: Hamidreza
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Roohafza
authors.affiliation: Psychosomatic Research Center, Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, Isfahan, Iran.
authors.forename: Hamid
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Afshar
authors.affiliation: Integrative Functional Gastroenterology Research Center, Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, Isfahan, Iran.
authors.forename: Peyman
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Adibi
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Public Health Faculty, Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, Isfahan, Iran.
authors.forename: Mohammad Reza
authors.initials: MR
authors.lastname: Maracy
keywords: Dietary behaviors; general health; mental health