Dietary Patterns and Data Analysis Methods
A special issue of Nutrients (ISSN 2072-6643). This special issue belongs to the section "Nutrition Methodology & Assessment".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 5 June 2026 | Viewed by 2598
Special Issue Editors
Interests: statistical analysis; nutrition; nutritional epidemiology; food frequency questionnaires; questionnaire validation; dietary assessment; food safety; dietary patterns; foodborne diseases
Interests: food supplements; nutrition; nutritional epidemiology; food safety; botanical safety; nutrient intake; obesity; lifestyle; sport nutrition; food consumption; nutritional status; vitamins; minerals; phytochemicals
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Dietary patterns play a crucial role in understanding the relationship between nutrition and health. Unlike single-nutrient approaches, which focus on individual dietary components, the study of dietary patterns considers the overall consumption of foods and their combinations. This holistic perspective allows us to capture the complexity of human diets and their impact on chronic diseases, metabolic health, and overall well-being.
To analyze dietary patterns, various data analysis methods are employed, ranging from traditional statistical techniques to advanced machine learning approaches. Common methods include factor analysis and principal component analysis (PCA) to identify dietary patterns, cluster analysis to classify individuals based on their eating habits, and dietary indices that assess adherence to predefined healthy eating guidelines. Additionally, newer computational methods, such as supervised and unsupervised machine learning models, are increasingly used to uncover complex relationships in dietary data.
Understanding dietary patterns through rigorous data analysis helps inform public health policies, guides nutritional recommendations, and supports personalized nutrition strategies. As data collection methods continue to evolve—through the improvement of food frequency questionnaires, dietary recalls, and digital tracking tools—so do the techniques used to extract meaningful insights from dietary data.
Authors are invited to submit original research articles, narrative or systematic reviews, meta-analyses, and clinical trials exploring the impact of dietary patterns on health using both conventional and alternative statistical methods. Submissions on food frequency questionnaire validation are also welcome.
Dr. Francesca Iacoponi
Dr. Silvia Di Giacomo
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Nutrients is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2900 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- dietary patterns
- nutrition
- food consumption
- food supplements
- dietary assessment
- data analysis
- food safety
- nutritional epidemiology
- food frequency questionnaires
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