Limited agreement exists between rationale and practice in athletes' supplement use for maintenance of health: a retrospective study

Table 1 Pairwise association (chi-square test statistics and corresponding p-values) between reason to use and type of supplements used (all athletes who use supplements n = 520), testing H₀: independence

	No time preparing meal	Avoid sickness	Over-come injury	Doctors' advice
Iron	χ ² = 1.798	χ ² = *11.940*	χ ² = 0.350	χ ² = *35.004*
	p = .180	p = *.001*	p = .554	p <*.001*
Ginseng	χ ² = 7.636	χ ² = 0.757	χ ² = 3.238	χ ² = 4.055
	p = .006	p = .384	p = .072	p = .044
Multi Vitamin	χ ² = 9.103	χ ² = 6.427	χ ² = 0.970	χ ² = 0.190
	p = .003	p = .011	p = .325	p = .892
Vitamin C	χ ² = 0.104	χ ² = *54.671*	χ ² = 0.012	χ ² = 0.005
	p = .747	p <*.001*	p = .912	p = .944
Magnesium	χ ² = 1.267	χ ² = 0.140	χ ² = 6.997	χ ² = 1.883
	p = .260	p = .708	p = .008	p = .170
Echinacea	χ ² = 1.206	χ ² = *40.343*	χ ² = 0.806	χ ² = 0.003
	p = .272	p <*.001*	p = .369	p = .959

ISSN: 1475-2891