A Framework for Increasing Equity Impact in Obesity Prevention

One of the most pressing unmet challenges for preventing and controlling epidemic obesity is ensuring that socially disadvantaged populations benefit from relevant public health interventions. Obesity levels are disproportionately high in ethnic minority, low-income, and other socially marginalized U.S. population groups. Current policy, systems, and environmental change interventions target obesity-promoting aspects of physical, economic, social, More

Technical Scientific Report. Healthy Beverage Consumption in Early Childhood: Recommendations from Key National Health and Nutrition Organizations

Research shows that what children drink – from birth through age 5 – can have a big impact on their health, as beverages make a significant contribution to dietary intake during this period. However, with so many choices available in the marketplace, it can be confusing for parents and caregivers to know which drinks are More

Consensus Statement. Healthy Beverage Consumption in Early Childhood: Recommendations from Key National Health and Nutrition Organizations

Research shows that what children drink – from birth through age 5 – can have a big impact on their health, as beverages make a significant contribution to dietary intake during this period. However, with so many choices available in the marketplace, it can be confusing for parents and caregivers to know which drinks are More

Promoting Responsive Bottle-Feeding Practices Among Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) Mothers to Reduce Infants’ Rapid Weight Gain and Obesity

Bottle-fed infants are at significantly greater risk for overfeeding and rapid weight gain (RWG), yet few studies focus on promoting healthy feeding practices for bottle-feeding caregivers. Bottle-feeding caregivers receive little support related to learning appropriate bottle-feeding practices, and this problem is pronounced in low-income, minority populations at higher risk for bottle-feeding, use of unhealthy feeding More

Studying the Impact of Financial Incentives at Point of Purchase on Low-Income Consumers’ Purchase of Healthy Food and, Subsequently, on Family Health

To address diet quality disparities in low-income families, policymakers and health experts recommend strategies such as financial incentives to promote consumption of fruits and vegetables (FVs). Real-time incentives for purchasing FV and variable incentives are promising, untested strategies to improve families’ diets and health. The goal of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of More

Examining State-Level Strategies to Implement Child-Care Licensing Regulations on Healthy Eating, Physical Activity, and Screen Time for Children

State child care licensing regulations, which specify the standards for practice to which child care providers must adhere to be licensed, can be a policy tool for ensuring that child care providers use healthy nutrition, physical activity, and screen time practices. However, what state agencies do to support child care providers in actually implementing these More

A National Research Agenda to Reduce Consumption of Sugar-Sweetened Beverages and Increase Safe Water Access and Consumption Among Zero- to Five-Year-Olds

Early childhood is a critical period for developing food preferences and dietary patterns. Despite dietary recommendations to limit or eliminate sugary drinks in early childhood, children ages 0 to 5 frequently drink these beverages. There is currently a lack of evidence on effective policy, systems, and environmental strategies to reduce sugary drink consumption and provide More

Best Practices and Innovative Solutions to Overcome Barriers to Delivering Policy, Systems and Environmental Changes in Rural Communities

This study investigated the barriers to implementing policy, systems, and environmental (PSE) change initiatives within Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program-Education (SNAP-Ed) programming in U.S. rural communities, as well as strategies to overcome these barriers. SNAP-Ed staff members across 15 states were surveyed and/or interviewed regarding the types nutrition-related PSE programming currently being implemented, barriers to implementation, More

Issue Brief. The Associations Between Sugar-Sweetened Beverage Consumption and Children’s Health: An Updated Review of the Literature

Consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs)—which include all drinks with added sugar, such as soda, fruit drinks, and sports drinks—is strongly linked to obesity and a number of other negative health consequences. This issue brief is based on a review of the literature on this topic and examines the evidence on: 1) the health impacts of More