scholarly journals The Impact of a Multi-Pronged Intervention on Students’ Perceptions of School Lunch Quality and Convenience and Self-Reported Fruit and Vegetable Consumption

Author(s):  
Stephanie S. Machado ◽  
Lorrene D. Ritchie ◽  
Hannah R. Thompson ◽  
Kristine A. Madsen

School lunch programs provide an opportunity to improve students’ diets. We sought to determine the impact of a multifaceted intervention (cafeteria redesigns, increased points-of-sale and teacher education) on secondary students’ perceptions of school-lunch quality and convenience and fruit and vegetable intake. Surveys (n = 12,827) from middle and high school students in 12 intervention and 11 control schools were analyzed. We investigated change in school-lunch perceptions and lunchtime and daily fruit and vegetable consumption from 2016 to 2018. Among 8th graders, perceptions that school lunch tastes good and that school lunch was enough to make students feel full increased 0.2 points (on a 5-point scale; p < 0.01) in intervention schools relative to control schools. Among 10th graders, lunchtime fruit and vegetable consumption increased 6% in intervention relative to control schools (p < 0.05 and p < 0.01 respectively). Daily fruit intake increased 0.1 cups/day in intervention relative to control schools among 9th graders (p < 0.01). This study provides important evidence on the limited effect of design approaches in the absence of meal changes. We observed only modest changes in school lunch perceptions and fruit and vegetable consumption that were not consistent across grades, suggesting that additional efforts are needed to improve school-lunch uptake.

2018 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-10 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah E. Roth ◽  
Monique Gill ◽  
Alec M. Chan-Golston ◽  
Catherine M. Crespi ◽  
Stephanie L. Albert ◽  
...  

Background and Purpose: Federal nutrition campaigns are designed to make dietary recommendations accessible but have not been extensively evaluated. This paper explores whether knowledge of nutrition campaigns is associated with dietary behavior among young adolescents. Methods: Cross-sectional survey data were collected from 4,773 middle school students in Southern California. Hierarchical logistic regression models were used to assess the association between dietary behaviors and nutrition campaign knowledge, controlling for gender and ethnicity. Results: Knowledge of the Fruit & VeggiesMore Matters campaign was associated with increased odds of high fruit and vegetable consumption, knowledge of the MyPlate campaign was associated with neither, and both were associated with increased odds of not consuming soda. Conclusion: Overall, low percentages of students demonstrated knowledge of nutrition campaigns, and knowledge was associated with some dietary behaviors. More research is needed to examine the impact of nutrition campaigns while also accounting for other psychosocial and environmental factors that may affect soda, fruit, and vegetable consumption.


2017 ◽  
Vol 87 (8) ◽  
pp. 616-622 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emily Thompson ◽  
David C. Johnson ◽  
Amy Leite-Bennett ◽  
Yingmei Ding ◽  
Komal Mehrotra

2010 ◽  
Vol 13 (11) ◽  
pp. 1931-1940 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip J Morgan ◽  
Janet M Warren ◽  
David R Lubans ◽  
Kristen L Saunders ◽  
Garbrielle I Quick ◽  
...  

AbstractObjectiveTo investigate the impact of school garden-enhanced nutrition education (NE) on children’s fruit and vegetable consumption, vegetable preferences, fruit and vegetable knowledge and quality of school life.DesignQuasi-experimental 10-week intervention with nutrition education and garden (NE&G), NE only and control groups. Fruit and vegetable knowledge, vegetable preferences (willingness to taste and taste ratings), fruit and vegetable consumption (24 h recall × 2) and quality of school life (QoSL) were measured at baseline and 4-month follow-up.SettingTwo primary schools in the Hunter Region, New South Wales, Australia.SubjectsA total of 127 students in Grades 5 and 6 (11–12 years old; 54 % boys).ResultsRelative to controls, significant between-group differences were found for NE&G and NE students for overall willingness to taste vegetables (P < 0·001) and overall taste ratings of vegetables (P < 0·001). A treatment effect was found for the NE&G group for: ability to identify vegetables (P < 0·001); willingness to taste capsicum (P = 0·04), broccoli (P = 0·01), tomato (P < 0·001) and pea (P = 0·02); and student preference to eat broccoli (P < 0·001) and pea (P < 0·001) as a snack. No group-by-time differences were found for vegetable intake (P = 0·22), fruit intake (P = 0·23) or QoSL (P = 0·98).ConclusionsSchool gardens can impact positively on primary-school students’ willingness to taste vegetables and their vegetable taste ratings, but given the complexity of dietary behaviour change, more comprehensive strategies are required to increase vegetable intake.


2012 ◽  
Vol 44 (4) ◽  
pp. 491-500 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard A. Dunn ◽  
Wesley R. Dean ◽  
Cassandra M. Johnson ◽  
Andrew Leidner ◽  
Joseph R. Sharkey

Fruit and vegetable consumption is associated with improved health outcomes, yet there is limited understanding of the impact of cost and accessibility on fruit and vegetable intake in rural settings. This study examines the relationship between the consumption of fruits and vegetables and their cost and accessibility among blacks and non-Hispanic whites in a rural area. Individual characteristics from a 2006 mail survey (n = 1,510) were combined with store locations and price information from a 2006 ground-truthed census of retail outlets. The mail survey covered seven counties in central Texas with 38 supermarkets/grocery stores. Blacks tended to live closer to a supermarket or grocery store, but they were only slightly more likely than whites to consume two or more servings of fruit daily and much less likely to consume three or more servings of vegetables. Multivariate probit regression analysis revealed that neither access nor cost was related to fruit or vegetable consumption among white respondents. Among blacks, cost was also not associated with consumption. In contrast to whites, however, each additional mile was associated with a three percentage point decline in the probability of consuming two or more servings of fruit daily and a 1.8 percentage point decline in the probability of consuming three or more vegetable servings.


2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 18-25 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ghobad Moradi ◽  
Ardeshir Rahimzadeh ◽  
Sorayya Amani ◽  
Jahanbakhsh Yousefi ◽  
Khaled Rahmani ◽  
...  

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (5) ◽  
pp. 837-846 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kelseanna Hollis-Hansen ◽  
Leah Vermont ◽  
Michelle L Zafron ◽  
Jennifer Seidman ◽  
Lucia Leone

Introducing mobile produce markets and farmers’ markets increased fruit and vegetable consumption in lower-income communities, while opening larger retailers (e.g. grocery stores) did not improve fruit and vegetable intake.


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