OBJECTIVES: To describe the main characteristics of the diet of Marrocan immigrants in the Autonomous Community of Madrid, and to explore the factors that may influence their selection of foods. DESIGN: Cross-sectional study. Two-stage cluster sampling of 179 immigrants. SETTING: Health Area number 6 of the Autonomous Community of Madrid. PARTICIPANTS: Marrocan immigrants, older than 14 years of age who had lived in Spain more than 3 months. INTERVENTIONS: Personal interview including a 24-hours recall of food consumption. Descriptive analysis and logistic regression using SPSS 8.0 for Windows. RESULTS: The factors that have a larger influence in the food consumed are the age of the person, whether the person lives in a couple or not, and whether the person is able to read and write in Spanish. Gender and number of years living in Spain had very limited or no influence in the food items referred to as consumed by the person. Conclusions.The results of our study contrast with findings from studies conducted in other countries. The diet of the immigrants in our study would seem to become more varied and balanced, and therefore improve, with the progression of the acculturation process, with age and in people who live with their partners. People who have migrated recently have a less varied diet and may be proned to suffer nutritional deficiences.

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male Spain female Food Humans Transients and Migrants Nutrition Physiology ethnology cross-sectional study Article Cross-Sectional Studies nutrition human adult Morocco migration