TY - JOUR
T1 - Children’s healthy eating habits and parents’ socio-demographic characteristics in rural Texas, USA
AU - Chen, Xuewei
AU - Cisse-Egbuonye, Nafissatou
AU - Spears, Erica C.
AU - Mkuu, Rahma
AU - McKyer, E. Lisako J.
N1 - Funding Information:
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: Funding for the project leading to this article was made possible (in part) by grant 1P20MD0002295 from the US National Center on Minority Health and Health Disparities.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2018, The Author(s) 2018.
PY - 2018/6/1
Y1 - 2018/6/1
N2 - Objective: Due to the disproportionately high rates of obesity within the US Hispanic community, there is a critical need to address this health disparity issue. The aim of this study is to examine the relationship between parents’ socio-demographic characteristics and their children’s food consumption. Design: Cross-sectional study. Setting: Participants were recruited from schools in a predominately Hispanic rural area of Texas, USA. Method: Parents (n = 298) of fourth grade (9–10 years old) children completed the survey. The independent variables were parents’ socio-demographic characteristics (e.g. ethnicity and income). The outcome variable was a Healthy Eating Index that refleting children’s frequencies of food consumption measured as daily frequency of consumption for healthy foods (e.g. skimmed milk), less healthy foods (e.g. potato) and unhealthy foods (e.g. Coke). We performed multiple linear regression. Results: Regression analysis shows that 13.7% variance of children’s food consumption could be predicted by their parents’ gender, ethnicity, marital status, education and income (R2 =.137, p < 0.01). Parents’ ethnicity, education and income variables were strong predictors for children’s food consumption. Conclusion: Healthy eating can help reduce childhood obesity; however, we found children of US Hispanic parents ate less healthily. Culturally specific education programmes should be adopted for parents or families of Hispanic or Latino origin.
AB - Objective: Due to the disproportionately high rates of obesity within the US Hispanic community, there is a critical need to address this health disparity issue. The aim of this study is to examine the relationship between parents’ socio-demographic characteristics and their children’s food consumption. Design: Cross-sectional study. Setting: Participants were recruited from schools in a predominately Hispanic rural area of Texas, USA. Method: Parents (n = 298) of fourth grade (9–10 years old) children completed the survey. The independent variables were parents’ socio-demographic characteristics (e.g. ethnicity and income). The outcome variable was a Healthy Eating Index that refleting children’s frequencies of food consumption measured as daily frequency of consumption for healthy foods (e.g. skimmed milk), less healthy foods (e.g. potato) and unhealthy foods (e.g. Coke). We performed multiple linear regression. Results: Regression analysis shows that 13.7% variance of children’s food consumption could be predicted by their parents’ gender, ethnicity, marital status, education and income (R2 =.137, p < 0.01). Parents’ ethnicity, education and income variables were strong predictors for children’s food consumption. Conclusion: Healthy eating can help reduce childhood obesity; however, we found children of US Hispanic parents ate less healthily. Culturally specific education programmes should be adopted for parents or families of Hispanic or Latino origin.
KW - Children
KW - Hispanic/Latino health diet
KW - healthy eating
KW - parents
KW - race/ethnicity
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85042231846&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1177/0017896917752014
DO - 10.1177/0017896917752014
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85042231846
SN - 0017-8969
VL - 77
SP - 444
EP - 457
JO - Health Education Journal
JF - Health Education Journal
IS - 4
ER -