Cambridge Metabolism
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Dr Janis Baird / Dr Christina Vogel: “How do local food environment factors and psychosocial factors affect the dietary behaviours of mothers with young children and what are the implications for dietary inequalities?”
11th November 2015 @ 12:30 pm - 1:30 pm
FreeAll are invited to the CEDAR/MRC Epidemiology Seminar by Dr Janis Baird and Dr Christina Vogel, of MRC Lifecourse Epidemiology, University of Southampton.
Abstract
Quality of diet is associated with level of disadvantage: findings from the Southampton Women’s Survey demonstrate that women with lower levels of educational attainment have significantly poorer diet quality than those with higher attainment. The poor diets of mothers with low educational attainment are of concern not only for their own health but particularly for the short- and long-term health of their children. A number of psychological and social factors, including self-efficacy and sense of control, have been associated with mothers’ level of educational attainment and dietary quality, but understanding of how local environmental factors interact with individual level factors in determining diet is more limited.
This seminar will focus on a programme of observational and complex intervention research that aims to understand and improve the dietary behaviours of women of childbearing age from disadvantaged backgrounds. We will describe the findings of our observational research examining associations between local food environment factors, individual factors and the dietary behaviours of mothers with young children, and will outline how our observational findings are being translated into complex community-based interventions.
About Janice Baird
Janis Baird is Associate Professor of Public Health Medicine at the MRC Lifecourse Epidemiology Unit, University of Southampton. Her research focuses on the translation of evidence of the developmental origins of health and disease into public health policy and practice. Currently, Janis co-leads a series of complex intervention studies which aim to improve the health and nutrition of women of childbearing age, with a particular focus on reducing inequalities. As well as having extensive experience of systematic review, she also has an interest in process evaluation and between 2011 and 2014 Janis chaired a group of researchers, funded by the Medical Research Council, who developed guidance on process evaluation within complex intervention studies. Read more.
About Christina Vogel
Christina Vogel is a Senior Research Fellow at the MRC Lifecourse Epidemiology Unit, University of Southampton. Her research is the first in the UK to examine the psychosocial and educational pathways between the local food environment and dietary behaviours. She has developed a number of novel environmental metrics to describe place-health relations that provide start-of-the-art alternatives for categorising the food environment. Her work in structural equation modelling has been used to identify environmental, social and psychological focal points for an intervention to improve the dietary behaviours of mothers which is in the early stage of development. Christina is particularly interested in identifying effective interventions that will provide mothers, particularly those from disadvantaged backgrounds, with the environments and skills to make more healthy dietary choices for themselves and their families. Read more.
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