142nd APHA Annual Meeting and Exposition

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Food Insecurity in Children: Development, Diet, and Dilemmas

142nd APHA Annual Meeting and Exposition (November 15 - November 19, 2014): http://www.apha.org/events-and-meetings/annual
Wednesday, November 19, 2014 : 1:15 PM - 1:30 PM

Maryah Fram, Ph.D. , College of Social Work; Center for Research in Nutrition and Health Disparities, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC
Lorrene Ritchie, PhD, RD , College of Natural Resources, Atkins Center for Weight and Health, UC-Berkeley, Berkeley, CA
Nila Rosen, MPH , Atkins Center for Weight and Health, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, CA
Edward A. Frongillo, PhD , Arnold Schoold of Public Health, Department of Health Promotion, Education, and Behavior, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC
Introduction.  Food insecurity contributes to a range of deficits in child health and development, but little is known about the mechanisms through which negative effects unfold.  In part, this has been due to a lack of data capturing both children’s own (vs. household) experiences of food insecurity and child nutritional and non-nutritional outcomes.  This study used a unique dataset to examine the association of child food insecurity (CFI) with child diet and physical activity (PA).  

Methods.  3605 4th and 5th grade children from 44 schools in California completed a diary-assisted 24-hour food recall and survey following participation in an intervention, the PowerPlay! Campaign.   Controlling for socio-demographic factors and for intervention/control group assignment, associations of CFI with diet quantity (amount of nutrients), diet quality (Healthy Eating Index (HEI) score and subscale scores), total minutes of PA, and barriers to PA (too tired for PA, weight as a barrier to PA, preference for PA) were assessed using linear and logistic regression.

Results.  Greater CFI was associated with higher consumption of total energy, sugar, and fiber, and lower HEI total vegetable subscale score.  Greater CFI was also associated with marginally fewer minutes of PA and greater perceived barriers to PA.

Discussion.  CFI is associated with what and how much children eat, and with their feelings about and experiences of PA.  This has implications for targeting interventions aimed at promoting healthy behaviors in the context of food insecurity.  It also suggests the need for additional study of CFI in relation to other bio-psycho-social pathways.

Learning Areas:

Chronic disease management and prevention
Planning of health education strategies, interventions, and programs
Social and behavioral sciences

Learning Objectives:
Identify the three domains in which children experience and identify food insecurity. Describe the dietary and physical activity pathways through which food insecurity influences child well-being. Discuss the programmatic and research implications of the relationships among child food insecurity, diet and physical activity.

Keyword(s): Food Security, Child Health

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I have been the principal investigator on multiple USDA funded grants focusing on child food-insecurity. My scholarship also includes grants and publications related to child development and children and families in poverty.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.

Back to: 5167.0: Experiences of food insecurity of children and youth in multiple countries.