by Reed Mangels, PhD, RD
About 2% of 8-17 year olds in the United States consistently were vegan and 21% sometimes or always ate vegan meals when eating out according to a 2021 poll commissioned by The Vegetarian Resource Group (1). There has been little research done on vegan tweens and teens, so it was intriguing to see a recent study of Austrian 10-19 year olds (2).
What is the study?
The study was conducted online and involved almost 8,700 students in Austria. The study subjects completed a questionnaire which asked about their nutrition habits, the motivations for their dietary choices, their physical activity levels, and their use of alcohol and tobacco. Participants were between 10 and 19 years old with the average age of 15.1 years. The researchers used a combination of the students’ description of their diets and reports of the food that they ate to designate them as vegan (no animal products or ingredients), vegetarian (no meat, poultry, fish or shellfish but ate eggs and dairy products), or nonvegetarian/omnivorous.
What did this study find?
Among the study participants, 142 or 1.6% were vegan, 5.6% were vegetarian, and the remainder (92.8%) were nonvegetarians. Vegan and vegetarian diets were more common in females than in males and in middle schoolers compared to high schoolers.
Health, sports performance, and animal welfare were the main motivations for those choosing vegan diets; animal welfare, personal health, and taste/preference were the top three motivations for vegetarians; and health, taste/preference, and no specific reason were the main reasons given for following a nonvegetarian diet.
Vegans were more active than the other two groups based on the number of days per week they participated in physical activity, sports, and exercise. More than 80% of vegans ate fruit daily which was significantly higher than either vegetarians (72%) or nonvegetarians (65%). More than 80% of both vegetarians and vegans ate vegetables daily; this was significantly more than nonvegetarians, 62% of whom ate vegetables daily. Vegans and nonvegetarians were less likely to consume alcohol than vegetarians were.
The study researchers conclude, “following a vegan diet during childhood and adolescence is associated with more advantageous health behavioral choices.”
Ideally, studies similar to this will be conducted in other countries to provide further insights into the health behaviors and motivations of vegan students.
References:
- Stahler C, Mangels R. How Many Youth in the U.S are Vegan? How Many Teens Eat Vegetarian When Eating Out? The Vegetarian Resource Group asks in a YouGov Poll. www.vrg.org/nutshell/Yougov2021youthteenwriteup.pdf. 2021.
- Wirnitzer KC, Tanous DR, Drenowatz C, et al. Difference in motives and basic health behavior of 8799 children and adolescents aged 10-19 years following a vegan, vegetarian, or omnivorous diet. Curr Dev Nutr. 2025;9:107498.
To read more about vegan teens see: