Anusara (Mai) Phetcharoen is a Master of Dietetics student working on the SNAP IT Study. Mai is looking how pre-bed time food and caffeine intake affects the quality of sleep in adolescents. Inadequate sleep in adolescents has been associated with numerous physical and mental health issues. Mai is interested to find out whether we can improve the quality of sleep in teenagers by looking at what they are consuming before bed time.
"Health and Nutrition is something I've been passionate about since I was young. Having family histories of diabetes and kidney disease I've always been health conscious. On top of that sleep is something I've been intrigued about since doing the physiology paper, there's just so much we don't know!"
SNAP IT Study is a project aimed to measure sleep, screen use, nutrition and physical activity in teenagers through the use of automated cameras. As student researcher, Mai has been involved with the organisation of many home visits. Attenting and organising these home visits has really boosted her confidence, as well as her communication and professional skills as a dietician.
A big foodie
Mai considers herself a big foodie. She was born in Thailand but moved to New Zealand together with her mother when she was 8 years old. Being raised in Thailand and New Zealand, Mai was brought up eating quite exotic and diverse foods. Mai loves to try foods from different cultures, and cannot wait to go traveling and try even more things.
Outside of work Mai enjoys painting, reading crime fiction and making bucket lists (guess what - traveling and trying foods is number one).
