We use variation in a la carte dessert availability to determine its impact on elementary school students' selection of reimbursable meals and healthful meal components. On days when desserts (ice ...cream and baked goods) were offered, students were less likely to select a reimbursable meal, and students who purchased a dessert selected fruit significantly less often. Data were collected in the Alachua County School District (Florida) for three weeks in May of 2013. These findings suggest that students substitute desserts for reimbursable meals and the healthier fruit component. Policies, such as Smart Snacks in Schools, that regulate the nutritional content of a la carte items, but do not remove a la carte items from school lunchrooms, may be less effective than intended if such substitution occurs.
This study explores the hypothesis that the mother's position within household power relations--her autonomy with respect to other household members--influences her ability to provide for the health ...of her children. We argue that in the context of the Arab Middle East, a woman's structural position within the household is a good indicator of her relative autonomy: if she is the daughter-in-law in a vertically extended residential unit, she has less autonomy than if she is head or co-head of household. Our analysis is based on data collected from 1341 households in 1985 as a part of the Follow-up Health and Population Assessment of four urban settlements in Amman, Jordan. They include measures of the child's weight and age, plus a variety of socioeconomic factors. We analyze the effect of the mother's autonomy on child nutritional status within a multiple regression framework that controls for rival hypotheses. In particular, we investigate whether it is the availability of other potential child-care substitutes, particularly the grandmother, that influences child nutrition rather than household structure. We also look at household income, mother's education, the area of residence, and the child's sex. Our results show a strong negative influence associated with having a mother whose autonomy in the household is low. This effect does not disappear when mother's age and education, and household size and composition are taken into consideration. Nor is it a proxy for the higher household incomes characteristic of extended-family residential units with their multiple earners.
This paper analyses the potential impact of introducing quality certification to the market for infant foods in a very low-income country, where malnutrition is widespread. Using an ...experimental-economics approach, we find that a program to sample, test and certify the nutrient density of products could promote a more competitive market for low-cost fortified foods and be implemented on a self-financing basis, yielding net economic benefits on the order of US$1 million per year in the city of Bamako. We find that mothers’ demand for quality information rises with their education and income level, but is higher than the estimated cost of certification even among the very poor and uneducated.
The major question addressed in this research is: 'Does maternal employment affect child dietary intake and nutritional status and if so, what mediating factors are important?' Maternal employment ...has been seen to have two conflicting effects on child nutrition--via increased income and decreased time available in the household. Efficiency and preferences of the household will vary and are likely to be of major importance in these relationships. A comprehensive measure of these inputs was devised using the concept of 'differentiation', defined as the capacity to process a diversity of information types. Various indicators of this concept were identified at both the household and the maternal levels and entered into a principal component analysis which generated composite variables. The data, including weighed dietary intakes and observed time use for mothers and substitutes, were collected during a 1 year stay in Panama. The results of a series of stepwise and multiple regression analyses lead to the conclusion that maternal employment, in this population, has a positive effect on child nutrition. In most cases, employment status enters into interactions with a variety of effect modifiers, suggesting the highly situational aspect of the relationships. Maternal time in home production decreases with her employment but total household time in these activities does not, due to the inputs of other household members. Maternal income seems to be of key importance to dietary intake. The maternal differentiation variable is consistently and positively related to dietary and anthropometric outcomes.
Extract: A study investigated the relationship of taste preference for sweetness to the food selections and preferences of a sample of 31 four-year olds. The children who preferred the sweetest ...sucrose solutions in the taste test chose sweeter apple juice samples for snacktime. This relationship was not as pronounced in the peanut butter samples selected for snacks. Children who preferred the sweetest sucrose solutions tended to have a generalized preference for sweet foods, as reported by parents on a dietary questionnaire. (author/kbc)
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