Using Service Design Tools in Community Nutrition Research: A Case Study in Developing Dietary Guidelines for Young Adults / 대한지역사회영양학회지

Objectives@#Recent epidemiological data reported that young adults in their 20 ~ 30s are a vulnerable population with unhealthy dietary practices and a few signs of deteriorated health indicators. However, there are no dietary guidelines that are specifically developed for the young adult population. This study introduces some data collection tools that are mostly used in the service design field, and demonstrates how these tools can be used in nutrition research for developing dietary guidelines for specific target groups. @*Methods@#To understand the context of food choices among young people, 39 people were enrolled to complete a probes booklet. Thematic analysis and word cloud were performed to capture the main themes from the probes and a persona was developed based on the findings. @*Results@#Data from the probes enabled us to grasp the various contextual meanings of eating practices among young people. Most participants understand what a healthy diet is and often have a willingness to practice it. However, there were very few participants who were following the practices. We created four types of persona for developing dietary guidelines: healthy eating, emotional eating, convenient eating, and trendy eating. @*Conclusions@#Probes and persona were used in order to understand the lives of young adults and develop targeted messages. We hope that this introduction will be helpful to researchers who are looking for new ways of understanding their target population in the field of community nutrition.

The effect of a healthy school tuck shop program on the access of students to healthy foods

The objective of this study was to evaluate the effect of a healthy school tuck shop program, developed as a way of creating a healthy and nutritional school environment, on students' access to healthy foods. Five middle schools and four high schools (775 students) participated in the healthy school tuck shop program, and nine schools (1,282 students) were selected as the control group. The intervention program included restriction of unhealthy foods sold in tuck shops, provision of various fruits, and indirect nutritional education with promotion of healthy food products. The program evaluation involved the examination of students' purchase and intake patterns of healthy foods, satisfaction with the available foodstuffs, and utilization of and satisfaction with nutritional educational resources. Our results indicated that among of the students who utilized the tuck shop, about 40% purchased fruit products, showing that availability of healthy foods in the tuck shop increased the accessibility of healthy foods for students. Overall food purchase and intake patterns did not significantly change during the intervention period. However, students from the intervention schools reported higher satisfaction with the healthy food products sold in the tuck shop than did those from the control schools (all P < 0.001), and they were highly satisfied with the educational resources provided to them. In conclusion, the healthy school tuck shop program had a positive effect on the accessibility of healthy food. The findings suggest that a healthy school tuck shop may be an effective environmental strategy for promoting students' access to healthy foods.

Workers intake too much salt from dishes of eating out and food service cafeterias; direct chemical analysis of sodium content

The average sodium intake of Koreans was reported to be 5,279.9 mg/day, which is one of the highest intake levels worldwide. The average Koreans intake 19.6% of sodium from kimchi, showing kimchi as the main contributor of sodium in this country (Ministry of Health and Welfare, 2005). The sodium content of dishes that are frequently chosen by workers, and which were served by foodservice cafeterias were chemically analyzed. The average sodium content of one meal provided by 10 foodservice cafeterias was 2,777.7 mg. Twenty-one, one-dish-meals, frequently chosen by workers for a lunch menu, were collected at 4 different restaurants for each menu by one male, aged in the twenties and analyzed chemically also. Workers who eat lunch at a workplace cafeteria everyday could intake about 8 g of salt at a one-time meal and those who eat out for a one-dish-meal would intake 3-8 g of salt without counting sodium content from the side dishes. From these study results, one could estimate that over 10 g of salt could be possible for a single meal for workers who eat out everyday. A nationwide nutrition campaign and education for low salt diets for restaurant owners and foodservice providers should be seriously considered.