Yvonne Nicholson

Food Insecurity and Food Supplies in Latino Households with Young Children

OBJECTIVE To examine the relationship between food insecurity and food supplies in Latino households. DESIGN Cross-sectional survey, conducted February to May 2001. SETTING Six California counties. PARTICIPANTS Convenience sampling was used to recruit 274 low-income Latino families with preschool children from the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC), Head Start, and other community-based organizations. Complete data were available for 256 families. VARIABLES MEASURED Food security, household food scores. ANALYSIS Pearson correlations, Kruskal-Wallis test, and logistics regression. Significance level at P <.05. RESULTS Controlling for maternal education, food insecurity over the past 3 months was associated with lower household food supplies: dairy, r = -.18, P <.01; fruit, r = -.36, P <.001; grains, r = -.27, P <.0001; meats, r = -.22, P <.001; snack foods, r = -.23, P <.001; and vegetables, r = -.29, P <.001. CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS In Latino households, greater food insecurity is associated with a lower variety of most foods, particularly fruits and vegetables. Future research in Latino households should explore the effects of seasonal food insecurity and household food shortages on food intake of individual household members, especially young children.

The Shaping Healthy Choices Program: Design and Implementation Methodologies for a Multicomponent, School-Based Nutrition Education Intervention

OBJECTIVE To provide a framework for implementation of multicomponent, school-based nutrition interventions. This article describes the research methods for the Shaping Healthy Choices Program, a model to improve nutrition and health-related knowledge and behaviors among school-aged children. DESIGN Longitudinal, pretest/posttest, randomized, controlled intervention. SETTING Four elementary schools in California. PARTICIPANTS Fourth-grade students at intervention (n = 252) and control (n = 238) schools and their parents and teachers. Power analyses demonstrate that a minimum of 159 students per group will be needed to achieve sufficient power. The sample size was determined using the variables of nutrition knowledge, vegetable preference score, and body mass index percentile. INTERVENTION A multicomponent school-based nutrition education intervention over 1 academic year, followed by activities to support sustainability of the program. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Dietary and nutrition knowledge and behavior, critical thinking skills, healthy food preferences and consumption, and physical activity will be measured using a nutrition knowledge questionnaire, a food frequency questionnaire, a vegetable preferences assessment tool, the Test of Basic Science Process Skills, digital photography of plate waste, PolarActive accelerometers, anthropometrics, a parent questionnaire, and the School and Community Actions for Nutrition survey. ANALYSIS Evaluation will include quantitative and qualitative measures. Quantitative data will use paired t, chi-square, and Mann-Whitney U tests and regression modeling using P = .05 to determine statistical significance.

Dietary Practices of Refugees from the Former Soviet Union

The breakdozon of the communist regime in the former Soviet Union resulted in a large post-cold war migration to the United States. The increasing number of these refugees participating in nutrition programs has created the need to understand their dietary patterns. This article highlights the continued use of the traditional foods and level of dietary acculturation in the United States.