Nutrition Education

About: Nutrition Education is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 8373 publications have been published within this topic receiving 144791 citations.

Why Americans Eat What They Do: Taste, Nutrition, Cost, Convenience, and Weight Control Concerns as Influences on Food Consumption

Abstract: Objective To examine the self-reported importance of taste, nutrition, cost, convenience, and weight control on personal dietary choices and whether these factors vary across demographic groups, are associated with lifestyle choices related to health (termed health lifestyle), and actually predict eating behavior. Design Data are based on responses to 2 self-administered cross-sectional surveys. The main outcomes measured were consumption of fruits and vegetables, fast foods, cheese, and breakfast cereals, which were determined on the basis of responses to questions about usual and recent consumption and a food diary. Subjects/setting Respondents were a national sample of 2,967 adults. Response rates were 71% to the first survey and 77% to the second survey (which was sent to people who completed the first survey). Statistical analyses Univariate analyses were used to describe importance ratings, bivariate analyses (correlations and t tests) were used to examine demographic and lifestyle differences on importance measures, and multivariate analyses (general linear models) were used to predict lifestyle cluster membership and food consumption. Results Respondents reported that taste is the most important influence on their food choices, followed by cost. Demographic and health lifestyle differences were evident across all 5 importance measures. The importance of nutrition and the importance of weight control were predicted best by subject's membership in a particular health lifestyle cluster. When eating behaviors were examined, demographic measures and membership in a health lifestyle cluster predicted consumption of fruits and vegetables, fast foods, cheese, and breakfast cereal. The importance placed on taste, nutrition, cost, convenience, and weight control also predicted types of foods consumed. Applications Our results suggest that nutritional concerns, per se, are of less relevance to most people than taste and cost. One implication is that nutrition education programs should attempt to design and promote nutritious diets as being tasty and inexpensive. J Am Diet Assoc. 1998;98:1118-1126 .

Maternal and Child Nutrition 3 Nutrition-sensitive interventions and programmes: how can they help to accelerate progress in improving maternal and child nutrition?

Abstract: Acceleration of progress in nutrition will require eff ective, large-scale nutrition-sensitive programmes that address key underlying determinants of nutrition and enhance the coverage and eff ectiveness of nutrition-specifi c interventions. We reviewed evidence of nutritional eff ects of programmes in four sectors—agriculture, social safety nets, early child development, and schooling. The need for investments to boost agricultural production, keep prices low, and increase incomes is undisputable; targeted agricultural programmes can complement these investments by supporting livelihoods, enhancing access to diverse diets in poor populations, and fostering women’s empowerment. However, evidence of the nutritional eff ect of agricultural programmes is inconclusive—except for vitamin A from biofortifi cation of orange sweet potatoes—largely because of poor quality evaluations. Social safety nets currently provide cash or food transfers to a billion poor people and victims of shocks (eg, natural disasters). Individual studies show some eff ects on younger children exposed for longer durations, but weaknesses in nutrition goals and actions, and poor service quality probably explain the scarcity of overall nutritional benefi ts. Combined early child development and nutrition interventions show promising additive or synergistic eff ects on child development—and in some cases nutrition—and could lead to substantial gains in cost, effi ciency, and eff ectiveness, but these programmes have yet to be tested at scale. Parental schooling is strongly associated with child nutrition, and the eff ectiveness of emerging school nutrition education programmes needs to be tested. Many of the programmes reviewed were not originally designed to improve nutrition yet have great potential to do so. Ways to enhance programme nutrition-sensitivity include: improve targeting; use conditions to stimulate participation; strengthen nutrition goals and actions; and optimise women’s nutrition, time, physical and mental health, and empowerment. Nutrition-sensitive programmes can help scale up nutrition-specifi c interventions and create a stimulating environment in which young children can grow and develop to their full potential.

Taste preferences and food intake

Abstract: Sensory responses to the taste, smell, and texture of foods help determine food preferences and eating habits. However, sensory responses alone do not predict food consumption. The view that a "sweet tooth" leads to obesity through excess sugar consumption is overly narrow. In reality, there are multiple links between taste perceptions, taste preferences, food preferences, and food choices and the amount of food consumed. Taste responses are influenced by a range of genetic, physiological, and metabolic variables. The impact of taste factors on food intake further depends on sex and age and is modulated by obesity, eating disorders, and other pathologies of eating behavior. Food preferences and food choices of populations are further linked to attitudinal, social, and--probably most important--economic variables such as income. Nutrition education and intervention strategies aimed at improving population diets ought to consider sensory pleasure response to foods, in addition to a wide range of demographic and sociocultural variables.