Research Results Food Access
| Food Access |
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Improving access to healthy, affordable foods can help reduce obesity among children as well as adults. The studies under this area focus on access to healthy foods through supermarkets, corner stores, restaurants, mobile vendors, farmers’ markets and other food outlets. Title: Engaging Tribal Leaders in an American Indian Healthy Eating Project Through Modified Talking Circles RWJF Grant ID: 66958
Principal Investigator: Daniel Rodriquez, PhD
Organization: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Results: Frequently used in the American Indian community, a Talking Circle is a method used by a group to discuss a topic in an egalitarian and non-confrontational manner. This article documents the development and implementation of a modified Talking Circle as a research tool to engage tribal leaders in an American Indian healthy eating project in North Carolina. The modified Talking Circle developed for this project was a culturally appropriate formative research approach which enabled researchers to garner support from seven tribes in North Carolina, as well as insights on developing planning and policy strategies to improve access to healthy eating within the participating tribes.
Title: Location of Food Stores Near Schools Does Not Predict the Weight Status of Maine High School Students RWJF Grant ID: 57920 Principal Investigator: Janet Whatley Blum, ScD Organization: University of Southern Maine Results: This article examines the relationship between stores selling calorie-dense foods near schools and student risk of being overweight or obese. Based on survey and geographic information systems (GIS) data for 11 Main high schools, researchers found ten schools with at least one store selling soda, and eight schools with at least one fast-food restaurant, within one kilometer of the school. Neither the proximity of stores selling food near schools nor the number of these stores around schools significantly predicted the likelihood of a student being overweight or obese.
Title: Food Expenditures and Food Purchasing Among Low-Income, Urban, African-American Youth RWJF Grant ID: 63149 Principal Investigator: Joel Gittelsohn, PhD, MS Organization: Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health Results: This paper examines food purchasing behaviors of lower-income, urban African-American youth in Baltimore, Maryland. Youth reported spending an average on $3.96 of foods and beverages in a typical day. Corners stores were the most frequently visited food outlets, with 59% of youth purchasing food from these venues at least twice per week. The most frequently purchased foods and beverages were chips/cheese curls, candy, soda and fruit punch. Greater youth purchasing was associated with a younger caregiver, and older age of youth was significantly associated with the amount spent on foods.
Title: Understanding the Rural Food Environment – Perspectives of Low-Income Parents RWJF Grant ID: 65051 Principal Investigator: David Hartley, PhD, MHA Organization: University of Southern Maine Results: This article focuses on the food environment and food shopping habits of lower-income residents in rural Maine. Focus groups were conducted with lower-income parents of children enrolled in Medicaid/State Children’s Health Insurance Program in Maine to ask them about their food shopping habits, the barriers they faced when trying to obtain food, places where they get their food, and their perception of healthy food. Cost, travel distance and food quality were factors that influenced efforts to get food. Parents described shopping habits that involved coupons and sales; traveling distances of up to 80 miles to purchase good quality, affordable foods; supplementing purchased food with food that is harvested, hunted and bartered; and using larger freezers to store bulk items for survival in ‘tough’ times.
Title: Healthy Food Purchasing Among African American Youth: Associations with Child Gender, Adult Caregiver Characteristics and the Home Food Environment RWJF Grant ID: 63149 Principal Investigator: Joel Gittelsohn, PhD, MS Organization: Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health Results: This article discusses how the home food environment and caregiver and youth characteristics are associated with healthy food purchasing among lower-income African-American youth. Researchers found that intentions to eat healthier, caregivers’ attitude towards healthy eating and more frequent food preparation by family members were each significantly associated with higher frequency of purchasing healthy foods among girls. No significant associations were observed for boys.
Title: Healthy Food Availability and Participation in WIC (Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children) in Food Stores around Lower- and Higher-Income Elementary Schools RWJF Grant ID: 63049 Principal Investigator: Barbara Laraia, PhD, MPH, RD Organization: University of California, San Francisco Results: This paper examines the range of food outlets around lower- and higher-income urban schools and compares the availability of healthy food items in those stores. It also examines whether stores accepting vouchers for WIC, a federal program for improving health and nutrition of lower-income mothers and their children, have more healthy items available than stores that do not accept WIC vouchers. Researchers found that students attending lower-income schools were exposed to more food outlets near those schools, which were stocked with fewer healthy foods than stores near higher-income schools. However, there were more food stores near lower-income schools that accepted WIC vouchers, which was associated with availability of healthy food items. The authors conclude that federal programs such as WIC may help increase availability of healthy foods in lower-income areas.
Title: An Analysis of Public Health Policy and Legal Issues Relevant to Mobile Food Vending RWJF Grant ID: 63049 Principal Investigator: Barbara Laraia, PhD, MPH, RD Organization: University of California, San Francisco Results: Mobile food vending as a venue for food access has received little attention in the public health literature. This paper outlines key components of mobile food vending regulation and provides examples from 12 U.S. cities to illustrate the variations surrounding these regulations. Then, using the regulatory framework, the authors describe how mobile food vending can be used to increase access to nutritious foods for vulnerable urban populations, highlighting existing examples of “healthy vending policies.”
Title: The Rationale behind Small Food Store Interventions in Low-Income Urban Neighborhoods: Insights from New Orleans RWJF Grant ID: 65048 Principal Investigator: Diego Rose, PhD, MPH Organization: Tulane University Results: This paper explores the rationale behind small store interventions by pulling together various studies in health, planning, and marketing literature and pilot work conducted in New Orleans. The authors discuss store and food availability in lower-income neighborhoods and how changing the foods available in stores can affect purchasing behavior, diet and the economics of local small food stores. Initiatives in New Orleans and elsewhere have demonstrated success with improving healthy food availability. However, the efforts to encourage small store operators to offer healthier foods may depend on the profitability of such changes.
Title: Separate and Unequal: The Influence of Neighborhood and School Characteristics on Spatial Proximity Between Fast Food and Schools RWJF Grant ID: 63155 Principal Investigator: Naa Oyo Kwate, PhD Organization: Columbia University Results: This article examines the location of fast food restaurants near schools in New York City, based on school type, school racial demographics and area racial and socioeconomic demographics. Researchers found that a minimum of 25% of schools had fast food restaurants within 400 meters. High schools had higher fast food clustering than elementary schools, and public high schools had higher clustering than private schools. Finally, public elementary and high schools with larger proportions of Black students or in neighborhoods with larger proportions of Black residents had more fast food clustering than the white counterparts.
Title: Planting the Seeds for Public Health: How the Farm Bill Can Help Farmers to Produce and Distribute Healthy Foods RWJF Grant ID: 65057 Principal Investigator: Jill Krueger, JD Organization: Farmers’ Legal Action Group Results: Resulting from a detailed legal analysis of the 2008 Farm Bill, this report finds that lack of information about yields and prices for fruits and vegetables has undermined farmers’ ability to make them more widely available and accessible. The report highlights the barriers the agriculture community faces in providing access to healthy foods, and provides key policy recommendations to help farmers to grow and distribute fruits and vegetables.
Title: Mobile Food Vending and the After-School Food Environment RWJF Grant ID: 63049 Principal Investigator: Barbara Laraia, PhD Organization: University of California, San Francisco Results: This article finds that mobile food vendors contribute to after-school snacking among children, and should be considered part of the school food environment. Based on data collected in Oakland, CA in the spring of 2008, researchers found a wide variety of vendors near schools. They include vendors who sell low-nutrient, calorie-dense items, such as ice cream and candy, and those who sell nutritious items, such as whole and processed (cut and bagged) fruits and vegetables. Forty percent of the whole and processed fruits and vegetables sold by vendors were consumed by children.
Title: Review of the Nutritional Implications of Farmers’ Markets and Community Gardens: A Call for Evaluation and Research Efforts Authors: Lacey Arneson McCormack, MPH, RD, Melissa Nelson Laska, PhD, RD, Nicole Larson, PhD, MPH, RD, Mary Story, PhD, RD Organization: RWJF Healthy Eating Research national program office, University of Minnesota Results: This article reviews the current literature on the effect of farmers’ market programs and community gardens on nutrition-related outcomes in adults. The outcomes investigated in these studies included dietary intake, attitudes and beliefs about buying, preparing and eating fruits and vegetables, and perceptions and behaviors related to acquiring produce from farmers’ markets and community gardens. The authors found that there are few studies with strong study designs that evaluate the effects of farmers’ markets and community gardens on nutrition-related outcomes. They conclude that more research is needed using well-established measures to examine the long-term influences of farmers’ market and community gardens.
Title: Healthy Food Availability in Small Urban Food Stores: A Comparison of Four U.S. cities RWJF Grant IDs: 65050, 63049, 63052, 63149 Principal Investigator: Kelley E Borradaile, PhD; Barbara Laraia, PhD, MPH, RD; Gary Foster, PhD; Joel Gittelsohn, PhD, MS Organizations: Temple University; University of California, San Francisco; Temple University; Johns Hopkins University Results: This article assesses the availability of healthy foods in small food stores within four metropolitan areas: Baltimore, Maryland; Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota; Oakland, California; and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Overall, availability of healthy foods within these small urban stores was limited. For nearly all food/beverage categories, scores regarding healthy food availability increased as store size increased. Source: Laska MN, Borradaile KE, Tester J, Foster GD, Gittelsohn J. Healthy food availability in small urban food stores: A comparison of four US cities. Public Health Nutr. 2010;13(7):1031-1035.
Title: Snacking in Children: The Role of Urban Corner Stores RWJF Grant ID: 63052; 65050 Principal Investigator: Gary D. Foster, PhD; Kelley E. Borradaile, PhD Organization: Temple University Results: This study provides data on what children purchase in corner stores located near their schools. The investigators collected data on 833 purchases that students made before and after school at 24 different corner stores. (Surveys were conducted immediately outside the stores after the students exited.) The students purchased an average of 1497.7 calories per corner-store visit, and most of them on energy-dense, low-nutritive items.
Title: Inequality in Obesigenic Environments: Fast Food Density in New York City RWJF Grant ID: 63155 Principal Investigator: Naa Oyo A. Kwate, PhD Organization: Columbia University Results: This paper documents the relation between racial and socioeconomic inequalities and the density of fast food in New York City. The researchers found that areas that were "predominantly Black" had higher densities of fast food than predominantly White areas, regardless of income level. Such results highlight the need to develop policy-level interventions to address racial disparities in food environments.
Title: Neighborhood Environments: Disparities in Access to Healthy Foods in the U.S. Authors: Nicole I. Larson, PhD, MPH, RD; Mary T. Story, PhD, RD; Melissa C. Nelson, PhD, RD Results: This comprehensive review examined 54 studies that evaluated neighborhood access to food outlets, the types of foods available in stores and restaurants, dietary information and weight status. The review found that individuals who have better access to supermarkets and limited access to fast-food restaurants tend to have healthier diets and lower rates of obesity. Individuals living in low-income, minority and rural neighborhoods are most often affected by poor access to supermarkets and healthful food while the availability of fast-food restaurants and high-fat, unhealthy foods tends to be greater in lower-income and minority neighborhoods. |
