Abstract
Scheduling play before eating lunch has been suggested as a relatively simple environmental
strategy to increase fruit and vegetable (FV) intake among elementary school students.
However, the few small studies to date have had mixed findings. The primary aim of
this observational study was to evaluate the possible relationship between the relative
order of play and eating and students’ lunch intake of FV. A secondary aim was to
examine whether any differences existed in this relationship by student sex, ethnicity,
language spoken at home, and school lunch source. A diary-assisted 24-hour recall
was collected during the 2011-2012 school year from 2,167 fourth- and fifth-graders
attending 31 elementary schools in California. The association of play before eating
with FV intake was estimated using Generalized Estimation Equations. Overall, lunch
FV intake was not significantly higher for students who had a play-before-eating vs
a play-after-eating lunch schedule at school. However, variables included in the model
showed significant interaction with play before eating, resulting in the need for
separate effect estimates for distinct strata based on sex, ethnicity, language spoken
at home, and school lunch source. For 10 of the 16 strata, no significant effect of
play before eating was observed on lunch FV intake, while increases in intake were
observed in four strata and decreases in two strata. Before rescheduling play before
eating for the purpose of improving student FV intake, additional research is recommended.
Keywords
To read this article in full you will need to make a payment
Purchase one-time access:
Academic & Personal: 24 hour online accessCorporate R&D Professionals: 24 hour online accessOne-time access price info
- For academic or personal research use, select 'Academic and Personal'
- For corporate R&D use, select 'Corporate R&D Professionals'
Subscribe:
Subscribe to Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and DieteticsAlready a print subscriber? Claim online access
Already an online subscriber? Sign in
Register: Create an account
Institutional Access: Sign in to ScienceDirect
References
- Correlates of fruit and vegetable intakes in US children.J Am Diet Assoc. 2009; 109: 474-478
- Family correlates of fruit and vegetable consumption in children and adolescents: A systematic review.Public Health Nutr. 2009; 12: 267-283
- Influences on child fruit and vegetable intake: Sociodemographic, parental and child factors in a longitudinal cohort study.Public Health Nutr. 2010; 13: 1122-1130
- Health benefits of fruits and vegetables.Adv Nutr. 2012; 3: 506-516
- Longitudinal tracking of adolescent smoking, physical activity, and food choice behaviors.Am J Public Health. 1994; 84: 1121-1126
- Tracking of fruit and vegetable consumption from adolescence into adulthood and its longitudinal association with overweight.Br J Nutr. 2007; 98: 431-438
- Getting children to eat more fruit and vegetables: A systematic review.Prev Med. 2006; 42: 85-95
- Will European agricultural policy for school fruit and vegetables improve public health? A review of school fruit and vegetable programmes.Eur J Public Health. 2008; 18: 558-568
- Recess placement prior to lunch in elementary schools: What are the barriers?.J Child Nutr Manag. 2006; 30: 1-6
- Food service and foods and beverages available at school: Results from the School Health Policies and Programs Study 2000.J Sch Health. 2001; 71: 313-324
National Association of State Boards of Education. State School Healthy Policy Database. http://www.nasbe.org/healthy_schools/hs/index.php. Accessed October 9, 2013.
- Food waste is reduced when elementary school children have recess before lunch.J Am Diet Assoc. 1996; 96: 906-908
- The relationship of meal and recess schedules to plate waste in elementary schools.J Child Nutr Manag. 2004; 28: 1-10
- Modifying the recess before lunch program: A pilot study in Kaneohe Elementary School.Ca J Health Promot. 2005; 3: 1-7
- Playground and plate waste.Sch Foodserv J. 1977; 31: 66-70
Montana Office of Public Instruction, School Nutrition Programs. Pilot Project Report: A recess before lunch policy in four Montana schools. April 2002-May 2003. http://opi.mt.gov/PDF/SchoolFood/RBL/RBLPilot.pdf. Accessed September 5, 2013.
- The scheduling of recess and the effect on plate waste at the elementary school level.Sch Foodserv Res Rev. 1985; 9: 40-44
- Evaluation of the fresh fruit and vegetable program (FFVP): Final evaluation report. Prepared by Abt Associates under contract no. AG-3198-D-09-0053.US Department of Agriculture, Food and Nutrition Service. Project Officers: Karen Castellanos-Brown and Allison Magness, Alexandria, VA2013
- Members of the Steering Committee; National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. Collection of food and dietary supplement intake data: What We Eat in America-NHANES.J Nutr. 2003; 133: 590S-600S
- Food and Nutrient Database for Dietary Studies, version 3.0.US Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service, Food Surveys Research Group, Beltsville, MD2008
- Longitudinal data analysis using generalized linear models.Biometrika. 1986; 73: 13-22
R Core Team. R: A language and environment for statistical computing. R Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna, Austria. ISBN 3-900051-07-0. www.R-project.org/. Accessed October 4, 2013.
- The R Package geepack for Generalized Estimating Equations.J Stat Softw. 2006; 15: 1-11
- A study of cross-validation and bootstrap for accuracy estimation and model selection.IJCAI. 1995; 14: 1137-1143
- Students consuming sack lunches devote more time to eating than those consuming school lunches.J Am Diet Assoc. 2002; 102: 1283-1286
- Dietary assessment methodology.in: Coulston A.M. Boushey C.J. Ferruzzi M. Nutrition in the Prevention and Treatment of Disease. Academic Press, San Diego2013: 5-46
- Measurement of dietary intake in children.Proc Nutr Soc. 2000; 59: 279-293
Biography
K. Fenton is a biostatistician, Seattle Genetics, Bothell, WA; at the time of the study, he was a research data analyst, Atkins Center for Weight and Health, University of California, Berkeley.
Biography
N. J. Rosen is a research associate, Atkins Center for Weight and Health, University of California, Berkeley.
Biography
P. Wakimoto is an associate researcher, Atkins Center for Weight and Health, University of California, Berkeley.
Biography
L. H. Goldstein is director of operations, Atkins Center for Weight and Health, University of California, Berkeley.
Biography
T. Patterson is a nutrition policy advocate, California Food Policy Advocates, Oakland.
Biography
L. D. Ritchie is director and cooperative extension specialist, Nutrition Policy Institute, Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources, University of California, Oakland.
Article info
Publication history
Published online: December 06, 2014
Accepted:
October 3,
2014
Footnotes
STATEMENT OF POTENTIAL CONFLICT OF INTEREST No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
FUNDING/SUPPORT This study was supported by a grant from the Orfalea Foundation.
Identification
Copyright
© 2015 Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
