Research progress of nutrition literacy assessment for children and adolescents / 中国学校卫生

Abstract@#Children and adolescents are at an important stage in the development of eating habits and food skills. Nutrition literacy is inseparable from healthy eating behaviors and higher nutritional quality, and improving nutrition literacy is an important pathway to better nutrition. The paper summarizes domestic and international research on nutrition literacy from the perspectives of definition and assessment tools in children and adolescents. It is found that there is no universal definition of nutritional literacy. Adult nutrition literacy or with appropriate adjustments are widely used in children and adolescents, without taking into account the unique developmental characteristics and nutritional needs of children and adolescents; the measurement tools of nutritional literacy are diverse, and there is no unified assessment tools, so it is difficult to compare and analyze research findings and draw reliable conclusions. In the future, authoritative definitions, and standardized evaluation tools are in great need.

Dietary preference and nutritional knowledge needs of the elderly at meal service sites in Shanghai / 上海预防医学

ObjectiveTo investigate the dietary preference and nutritional knowledge needs of the elderly people who dined at meal service sites. MethodsUsing the form of stratified and convenience sampling method with self-designed questionnaire was used， in November 2021， to select 700 elderly people who dine at meal service sites in 7 jurisdictions in Shanghai were selected， and a self-designed questionnaire was used to investigate the basic information. Results91.64% of the elderly surveyed would eat at relatively fixed meal service sites， and the total Dietary Diversity Score （DDS9） was 3.56±1.46. 41.45% of the elderly with diseases preferred unhealthy cooking methods. Only 8.03% of the surveyed seniors said they were unwilling to accept targeted and personalized nutrition tips and reminders. Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that the probability reaching the “understanding” level of “Food Guide Pagoda for Chinese Residents” and “Four Principles Recommended by the Core Dietary Guidelines for the Elderly” was different in the elderly with different education levels. The willingness of the elderly to expect to receive different nutrition tips and reminders was related to whether they cared about the corresponding contents. There was a statistically significant difference （P<0.05） among the elderly who were concerned about different health problems in terms of the willingness to receive different nutritional tips. There were significant differences in the proportion of elderly people with different health status for intervention （χ2=5.402， P<0.05）. ConclusionThe elderly who dine at meal service sites are highly dependent on the sites， have a low level of dietary diversification， and do not have a high degree of understanding of nutrition-related knowledge， and have a high demand for targeted nutritional interventions. Nutritional interventions for the sick elderly should be piloted through multiple channels.

Effect of an educational intervention on nutrition literacy in teachers: a short communication

@#Introduction: Teachers, by creating a culture of health within their classrooms, are agents of change and have an important role during students’ formative years. This study aimed to investigate the effect of an educational intervention on the nutrition literacy of primary school teachers in Yasuj. Methods: In this quasiexperimental study, 110 primary school teachers in Yasuj, who were randomly selected from two areas of the city (intervention and comparison groups), were included in the study. Nutrition literacy was measured by using a validated tool for the Iranian society. After analysing the data, the educational content and structure were developed to improve nutrition literacy. The intervention consisted of two training sessions, provision of educational pamphlets and sending of two SMS messages. Data were analysed before and three months after the intervention by using SPSS16 software. Results: Before the intervention, the mean ± standard deviation of nutrition literacy in the comparison and intervention groups were 27.04±3.15 and 27.25±3.27, respectively. According to repeated measures ANOVA, nutrition literacy score improved significantly three months after the intervention (p time = 0.001). Besides, there was a significant difference between the two groups (p group = 0.03). The interaction between time and group was also significant (p time × group = 0.001). Conclusion: The educational intervention led to an improvement in the nutrition literacy of primary school teachers in Yasuj.

The impact of nutrition literacy on the food habits among young adults in Turkey

BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES: Youth is the crucial stage between childhood and adulthood during which an individual acquires new behavior and practices including dietary habits, that may be influenced by his peers, social circle, nutrition knowledge level and other factors. The increase in awareness of young adults is of special importance from the perspective of health and prevention of obesity related chronic diseases. To measure the nutrition literacy level of university students using the Turkish version of Adolescent Nutrition Literacy Scale (ANLS). We evaluated their food habits using the Adolescent Food Habit Checklist (AFHC) tool and analysed it, if the eating habits were affected by nutrition literacy level. SUBJECTS/METHODS: A cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted on randomly selected 276 students studying in the Faculty of Health Sciences of Istanbul Aydin University, Turkey. Data was collected by means of ANLS and AFHC tools by face to face interview method. SPSS statistical sofware (IBM SPSS Statistics 19) was used to analyse the obtained data. RESULTS: Participants comprised of 47.1% males and 52.9% females with mean age of 20.0 ± 1.60 years. Mean body mass index (BMI) was determined as 22.4 ± 3.76 (23.6 ± 3.63 males 21.3 ± 3.57 females). Functional, interactive and critical nutritional literacy scores for male participants were 22.49 ± 5.71, 17.45 ± 4.84, and 28.28 ± 7.13 respectively (total 64.98 ± 10.15). For females the values were 24.66 ± 5.13, 20.17 ± 4.28, and 32.20 ± 5.65 (total 69.72 ± 8.59) respectively. For all the three sub-categories of nutrition literacy, the scores acquired by females were significantly higher than males (P < 0.001). In the AFHC tool, the mean score acquired by males were 9.26 ± 4.18 whereas for females it was 10.37 ± 3.40 significantly higher as compared to males (P = 0.007). CONCLUSIONS: The food habits of female participants were better than males; in accordance with their nutrition literacy status. It may be concluded that food habits are influenced by nutrition literacy and therefore stress much be given to increase the nutrition awareness among children youth as well as adults.

Advances on research of nutrition literacy and nutrition literacy assessment tools / 中华预防医学杂志

Health literacy has become a vibrant area of research, and the nutrition literacy and health literacy were closely related as well as a growing number of inquiries have focused on direct measures of nutrition literacy. In this paper, we summarized some features such as the structure, the content, the reliability, the validity and the application of the general nutrition literacy assessment tools and the health literacy assessment tools related to nutrition literacy, furthermore the evaluation contents were listed as the understanding capacity, numeracy capacity, household food measurement, food group, and basic nutrition knowledge. In addition, the briefly the nutrition information readability assessment tools were also summarized. The research results of nutritional literacy and its assessment tools would provide reference for the development of nutrition literacy assessment tools and evaluation work in China.

Comparison of maternal nutrition literacy, dietary diversity, and food security among households with and without double burden of malnutrition in Surabaya, Indonesia

@#Introduction: Double burden of malnutrition in the form of stunted child and overweight/obese mother has been increasing in countries experiencing nutrition transition. This study aimed to compare maternal nutrition, literacy, dietary diversity, and food security of households categorised by nutritional status of mother-child pairs. Methods: This cross-sectional study included a total of 685 children under 5 years of age from 14 community health centres (posyandu) in a poor urban area of Surabaya, Indonesia. The Lemeshow formula was used to compute sample size. The children and their mothers were categorised into motherchild pairs based on maternal body mass index (BMI) and height-for-age z-score for the child: non-overweight mother-non-stunted child (NM), non-overweight mother and stunted child (SC), overweight/obese mother and non-stunted child (OWT), stunted child and overweight/obese mother (SCOWT). Nutrition literacy was determined using questionnaires, dietary diversity was estimated using household dietary diversity scores, and food security was determined using the Household Food Insecurity Access Scale (HFIAS). Results: The prevalence of households with SCOWT double burden of malnutrition was 21.2%, OWT 37.7%, SC 15.3% and 25.8% were normal (NM). There were significant differences in maternal nutrition literacy, dietary diversity and household food security status. Households with NM pairs were shown to be most food secure followed by OWT, SC and lastly, the SCOWT pairs. Conclusion: Households with double burden of malnutrition have relatively lower nutrition literacy, dietary diversity, and food security. This study indicates the importance of developing nutritional strategies to enable low-income households to make healthy food