Food insufficiency and American school-aged children's cognitive, academic, and psychosocial development.

By K. Alaimo, C. Olson, E. Frongillo. Pediatrics, 2001

981 citations recorded by the source corpus.

OBJECTIVE This study investigates associations between food insufficiency and cognitive, academic, and psychosocial outcomes for US children and teenagers ages 6 to 11 and 12 to 16 years. METHODS Data from the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES III) were analyzed. Children were classified as food-insufficient if the family respondent reported that his or her family sometimes or often did not get enough food to eat. Regression analyses were conducted to test for associations between food insufficiency and cognitive, academic, and psychosocial measures in general and then within lower-risk and higher-risk groups. Regression coefficients and odds ratios for food insufficiency are reported, adjusted for poverty status and other potential confounding factors. RESULTS After adjusting for confounding variables, 6- to 11-year-old food-insufficient children had significantly lower arithmetic scores and were more likely to have repeated a grade, have seen a psychologist, and have had difficulty getting along with other children. Food-insufficient teenagers were more likely to have seen a psychologist, have been suspended from school, and have had difficulty getting along with other children. Further analyses divided children into lower-risk and higher-risk groups. The associations between food insufficiency and children's outcomes varied by level of risk. CONCLUSIONS The results demonstrate that negative academic and psychosocial outcomes are associated with family-level food insufficiency and provide support for public health efforts to increase the food security of American families.

Subfields: General Health Professions, Psychiatry and Mental health, Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/29cd61d634786dd3b075eeeb06349a98ea0535c6

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In General Health Professions

1. V. Tarasuk
2. Cliff A. Robb
3. C. Gundersen
4. M. Nord
5. Alisha Coleman-Jensen

In Psychiatry and Mental health

1. V. Tarasuk
2. C. Gundersen
3. Alisha Coleman-Jensen
4. M. Nord

In Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health

1. V. Tarasuk
2. Alisha Coleman-Jensen
3. M. Nord

Citations in the corpus

• Food Hardship and Child Behavior Problems among Low‐Income Children (2005, background): “This measure addresses the amount of food available to a household, not the quality of the food consumed or worries about food (Alaimo, Olson, and Frongillo 1999; Dunifon and Kowaleski-Jones 2003).”
• Examining the role of financial factors, resources and skills in predicting food security status among college students (2014, background): “Food insecurity negatively impacts academic performance, mental and social health, dietary choices and overall health status among adolescents and young adults (Kleinman et al., 1998; Murphy et al., 1998; Rose, 1999; Alaimo et al., 2001; Jyoti et al., 2005; Nord and Prell, 2007).”
• Poverty, food insecurity, and nutritional outcomes in children and adults. (2004, background): “Moreover, numerous research papers have used these new questions to analyze a variety of topics (for recent examples, see Alaimo and Olson, 2001; Borjas, 2002; Kowaleski-Jones and Dunifon, 2001; Siefert et al., 2001; Weinreb et al., 2002; and Winship and Jencks, 2002; for a detailed bibliography,…”
• The Influences of Participation in the National School Lunch Program and Food Insecurity on Child Well‐Being (2003, background): “In a series of studies, Alaimo, Olson, and Frongillo (2001; Alaimo et al. 2001) find food insufficiency to be associated with adverse outcomes among children, including lower math scores, greater problems getting along with others, poor health status, and more frequent illness.”
• Household food insufficiency is associated with poorer health. (2003, background): “Food sufficiency has also been shown to be associated with poor general and physical health, and with negative psychosocial outcomes in American children (13,14,66), and with depressive disorders and suicidal behaviors in American teens (15).”