Abstract
Background
Nutrient profiling of foods is the science of ranking or classifying foods based on
their nutrient composition. Most profiling systems use similar weighting factors across
nutrients due to lack of scientific evidence to assign levels of importance to nutrients.
Objective
Our aim was to use a statistical approach to determine the nutrients that best explain
variation in Healthy Eating Index (HEI) scores and to obtain β-coefficients for the
nutrients for use as weighting factors for a nutrient-profiling algorithm.
Design
We used a cross-sectional analysis of nutrient intakes and HEI scores.
Participants
Our subjects included 16,587 individuals from the National Health and Nutrition Examination
Survey 2005-2008 who were 2 years of age or older and not pregnant.
Main outcome measure
Our main outcome measure was variation (R2) in HEI scores.
Statistical analyses
Linear regression analyses were conducted with HEI scores as the dependent variable
and all possible combinations of 16 nutrients of interest as independent variables,
with covariates age, sex, and ethnicity. The analyses identified the best 1-nutrient
variable model (with the highest R2), the best 2-nutrient variable model, and up to the best 16-nutrient variable model.
Results
The model with 8 nutrients explained 65% of the variance in HEI scores, similar to
the models with 9 to 16 nutrients, but substantially higher than previous algorithms
reported in the literature. The model contained five nutrients with positive β-coefficients
(ie, protein, fiber, calcium, unsaturated fat, and vitamin C) and three nutrients
with negative coefficients (ie, saturated fat, sodium, and added sugar). β-coefficients
from the model were used as weighting factors to create an algorithm that generated
a weighted nutrient density score representing the overall nutritional quality of
a food.
Conclusions
The weighted nutrient density score can be easily calculated and is useful for describing
the overall nutrient quality of both foods and diets.
Keywords
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Biography
J. E. Arsenault is a nutrition policy analyst, RTI International, Research Triangle Park, NC.
Biography
J. C. Hersey is a senior scientist, RTI International, Research Triangle Park, NC.
Biography
M. K. Muth is a program director, RTI International, Research Triangle Park, NC.
Biography
V. L. Fulgoni is senior vice president, Nutrition Impact, LLC, Battle Creek, MI.
Article info
Publication history
Published online: November 20, 2012
Accepted:
July 16,
2012
Footnotes
STATEMENT OF POTENTIAL CONFLICT OF INTEREST No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
FUNDING/SUPPORT This work was supported by contract HHSP23320095651WC with the Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation.
Identification
Copyright
© 2012 Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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