TY - JOUR
T1 - Modeling the diet dynamics of children
T2 - the roles of socialization and the school environment
AU - Safan, Muntaser
AU - Murillo, Anarina L.
AU - Wadhera, Devina
AU - Castillo-Chavez, Carlos
N1 - Funding Information:
This project has been partially supported by grants from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, the Graduate Assistance in Areas of National Need (GAANN), the National Science Foundation (DMS 1263374), the National Security Agency (H98230-15-1-0021), the Office of the President of ASU, and the Office of the Provost at ASU. ALM acknowledges funding from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant number T32HL072757. We would like to dedicate this research to Dr. Elizabeth D. Capaldi-Phillips, whose contribution to the field of eating behaviours in psychology, commitment to ASU education programmes, as well as invaluable comments and suggestions on this study, made this research possible. The authors would also like to acknowledge two anonymous reviewers for suggestions that have helped to improve the quality and presentation of our manuscript.
Funding Information:
This project has been partially supported by grants from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, the Graduate Assistance in Areas of National Need (GAANN), the National Science Foundation (DMS 1263374), the National Security Agency (H98230-15-1-0021), the Office of the President of ASU, and the Office of the Provost at ASU. ALM acknowledges funding from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant number T32HL072757.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2018, © 2018 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
PY - 2018/12/14
Y1 - 2018/12/14
N2 - Childhood obesity is a health emergency in many parts of the world including the U.S. and, consequently, identifying local, regional or national intervention models capable, of altering the dynamics of obesity at scales that make a difference remains a challenge. The fact that consumption of healthful foods among most youth has yet to meet recommended nutritional standards highlights a lack of effective policies aimed at addressing the epidemic of obesity. Mathematical models are used to evaluate the roles of socialisation and school environment on the diet dynamics of children. Data suggest that standard nutrition education programmes may have, at best, minimal impact in altering diet dynamics at the population-level. Inclusion of peer influence (model as contagion) reinforced by the use of culturally-sensitive school menus (environmental disruption) may prove capable of modifying obesity enhancing diet dynamics; altering the diets of a significant (critical) proportion of youngsters. A framework is introduced to explore the value of behaviour-based interventions and policies that account for the sociocultural environments of at risk communities. These models capture carefully choreographed scenarios to account for the fact that when dealing with diet-dynamics systems, thinking additively is not enough as it cannot account for the power of nonlinear effects.
AB - Childhood obesity is a health emergency in many parts of the world including the U.S. and, consequently, identifying local, regional or national intervention models capable, of altering the dynamics of obesity at scales that make a difference remains a challenge. The fact that consumption of healthful foods among most youth has yet to meet recommended nutritional standards highlights a lack of effective policies aimed at addressing the epidemic of obesity. Mathematical models are used to evaluate the roles of socialisation and school environment on the diet dynamics of children. Data suggest that standard nutrition education programmes may have, at best, minimal impact in altering diet dynamics at the population-level. Inclusion of peer influence (model as contagion) reinforced by the use of culturally-sensitive school menus (environmental disruption) may prove capable of modifying obesity enhancing diet dynamics; altering the diets of a significant (critical) proportion of youngsters. A framework is introduced to explore the value of behaviour-based interventions and policies that account for the sociocultural environments of at risk communities. These models capture carefully choreographed scenarios to account for the fact that when dealing with diet-dynamics systems, thinking additively is not enough as it cannot account for the power of nonlinear effects.
KW - Socioepidemiology
KW - contagion
KW - differential equations
KW - ecological modelling
KW - nutrition
KW - population dynamics
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U2 - 10.1080/23737867.2018.1552543
DO - 10.1080/23737867.2018.1552543
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85058229050
SN - 2373-7867
VL - 5
SP - 275
EP - 306
JO - Letters in Biomathematics
JF - Letters in Biomathematics
IS - 1
ER -