Greater access to healthy food outlets in the home and school environment is associated with better dietary quality in young children. Issue 18 (31st August 2017)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Barrett, Millie; Crozier, Sarah; Lewis, Daniel; Godfrey, Keith; Robinson, Sian; Cooper, Cyrus; Inskip, Hazel; Baird, Janis; Vogel, Christina
• Is Part Of: Public health nutrition. Volume 20:Issue 18(2017)
• Page Start: 3316
• Page End: 3325
• Publication Date: 2017-08-31
• Subjects: Food outlet exposure, -- Activity space, -- Children's diet quality, -- Primary school-aged children; Nutrition -- Periodicals; Nutrition policy -- Periodicals; Public health -- Periodicals; 613.2
• DOI: 10.1017/S1368980017002075
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1368-9800

Abstract

Abstract: Objective: To explore associations between dietary quality and access to different types of food outlets around both home and school in primary school-aged children. Design: Cross-sectional observational study. Setting: Hampshire, UK. Subjects: Children ( n 1173) in the Southampton Women's Survey underwent dietary assessment at age 6 years by FFQ and a standardised diet quality score was calculated. An activity space around each child's home and school was created using ArcGIS. Cross-sectional observational food outlet data were overlaid to derive four food environment measures: counts of supermarkets, healthy specialty stores (e.g. greengrocers), fast-food outlets and total number of outlets, and a relative measure representing healthy outlets (supermarkets and specialty stores) as a proportion of total retail and fast-food outlets. Results: In univariate multilevel linear regression analyses, better diet score was associated with exposure to greater number of healthy specialty stores ( β =0·025sd /store: 95 % CI 0·007, 0·044) and greater exposure to healthy outlets relative to all outlets in children's activity spaces ( β =0·068sd/ 10 % increase in healthy outlets as a proportion of total outlets, 95 % CI 0·018, 0·117). After adjustment for mothers' educational qualification and level of home neighbourhood deprivation, the relationship between diet and healthy specialty stores remained robust ( P =0·002) while the relationship with the relative measure weakened ( P =0·095). Greater exposure to supermarkets and fast-food outlets was associated with better diet only in the adjusted models ( P =0·017 and P =0·014, respectively). Conclusions: The results strengthen the argument for local authorities to increase the number of healthy food outlets to which young children are exposed.