Background: The consumption of fruits, vegetables, and whole grains (FVWG) has been associated with decreased risk of chronic disease, yet over 80% of U.S. adults do not meet dietary recommendations for FVWG. Purpose: This study explored the effectiveness of a teaching kitchen intervention upon consumption of FVWG and overall dietary patterns.…

Background: Poor complementary feeding practices can expose young children to increased burdens of undernutrition, morbidity, and poor health outcomes in adulthood. Parents and caregivers, who feed the children, are shaped by socio-cultural beliefs and pervasive socioeconomic realities. Also, parental values are influenced by their perceptions and…

Objective: African Americans in the USA experience a disproportionate burden of chronic disease. Healthy lifestyle promotion programmes can help decrease this disease risk. This study determined the feasibility of using dyadic peer support to augment an existing healthy lifestyle programme in African American churches. Design: A prospective…

Healthful dietary intakes are crucial for stemming the current childhood obesity epidemic. We examined the dietary intakes of 392 Michigan children aged 1-12 years. About 70% and 58% of children ate fruits and vegetables, respectively, each day; 26% drank sugar-sweetened beverages; and 31% ate with a television on. Children's vegetable intakes…

Food is essential to human existence. What we eat and how we eat says who we are. There has long been interest in describing and explaining our connections to food as well as understanding the different ways food shapes our lives. In the last decades, there has been an explosion of interest on food issues. Best-selling books such as "The…

We evaluated the effects of a multicomponent intervention to address food selectivity issues of 3 preschoolers with developmental disabilities. The intervention comprised strategies evidencing ecological validity in both research and practice. All sessions took place during typical mealtimes in children's classroom or lunchroom, with peers…

Cooking attitudes and behaviors among college students--and related implications to dietary quality--are largely unexplored. This study assessed the relationship between college students' fruit and vegetable intakes and cooking attitudes, confidence, and frequency (N = 448) using a cross-sectional survey. Hierarchical linear regression models…

The purpose of this study was to examine the association between perceived weight change since high school and perceived factors contributing to weight change, or lack thereof, among college students. Students from a large university in the Northeast of the United States self-reported socio-demographic characteristics, and perceived factors…

Education for sustainable nutrition will only succeed if society is given direct access and experience to the obvious benefits of a sustainable lifestyle. An earlier personal and positive association to a sustainable lifestyle makes a dietary shift most likely. Here, the training future teachers plays a central role as a multiplicator.…

Kids SIP"smart"ER is a 6-month behavioral and health literacy intervention effective at reducing sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) intake among middle school students and their caregivers in the rural Appalachian region. This exploratory mixed methods study utilized a convergent parallel design to assess participant acceptability of a…

Latino parents support children's academic skills through their involvement in daily living activities. Prior work has focused on conventional literacy (e.g., book reading) and numeracy activities (e.g., teaching numbers). Less-visible home activities that are high-priority, high-value cultural practices in Latino communities are food sharing…

Objective: This research examines the effects of educational materials, delivered with "take-home and cook-with-friends" meal kits, on college students' food agency. Participants: In the spring of 2021, 186 students were recruited at a US public university and randomly allocated into either an intervention group that received meal kits…

Objective: Determine the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the changes in training, sleep, diet, and mental health of cross-country runners. Participants: Cross-country runners from NCAA Division II institutes. Methods: Wilcoxon signed-rank test was performed to analyze survey responses to ordinal questions on the survey while Spearman's rank…

Objective: To investigate change in health behaviors and anxiety one year after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Participants: University students (n = 525) and faculty/staff (n = 136) surveyed in February-April 2021. Methods: Cross-sectional survey on health behaviors and anxiety before and during the pandemic. Comparison by time and between…

The health education in schools became the focus of public attention during the global pandemic of COVID-19. Teaching practice changed to meet the increased demand for pupils' health, triggering a reevaluation of higher education curricula for pedagogical students. Therefore, this mixed methods study aimed to investigate the lifestyle of…