In a study of 1,736 university students aged 18 and over, 72% of former comprehensive pupils claim to eat takeaway food more than once a week, compared to only 31% of grammar school students.

 

Fast food meals such as McDonald's and fish and chips are the food of choice for the majority of former comprehensive students, with over half of students, 54%, claiming to eat one of these meals per week at least.

 

When asked, 'How healthy do you think your diet is?', 24% of former grammar school pupils agreed that their diet was very healthy, compared to just 6% of comprehensive students.

 

At the opposite end of the spectrum, 34% of comprehensive students stated that their diets were very unhealthy‚ with just 17% of grammar school students alleging to the same fact.

 

When posed with the question, 'Would you consider trying different types of takeaway other than fast food, Indian, Chinese and pizza?', grammar school pupils answered much more positively than their comprehensive counterparts, with 83% and 60% respectively.

 

Ash Ali, Marketing Manager of www.just-eat.co.uk said: "Obesity is a major worry in our society. Leading an active lifestyle and treating takeaways as a treat should be more important now than ever before. In terms of the results, I can only suggest that Grammar school pupils are more educated as to the benefits of a healthier lifestyle in terms of diet and exercise. Other than speculation, it really is not for me to comment."

He continued: "There are many healthy option takeaways available, such as Italian takeaways and sushi, which has seen a huge rise in sales over the last year. Our intention was not to target Comprehensive and Grammar school students in our efforts to spot potential areas for marketing, but the correlation was too great to ignore."