Progress 07/01/08 to 06/30/13
Outputs
Target Audience: Academic researchers, government policy makers, general public, public health educators. Changes/Problems:
Nothing Reported
What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided? The project has provided support for the PI to develop and teach two Ph.D. level courses that equip students with necessary quantitative skills and health economic knowledge for solid applied economics work in the area of food and health economics. The PhD field course, Food and Health Macroeconomics, taught in Fall 2011 had resulted in five papers on health-related topics accepted and presented at national conferences under my guidance and these papers are currently in preparation for journal submission. A total of four Ph.D. students have graduated under the PI's guidance and three Masters have graduated under the PI's guidance. The PI of this HATCH also regularly serves as mentor to graduate students from multiple departments. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest? The results have been disseminated via peer-reviewed publications, seminars, conference presentations, poster presentations and workshop talk. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?
Nothing Reported
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
The focus of my research program has been to understand the economic causes of health disparities through the creative integration of economics and other disciplines. My primary focus is on the obesity epidemic that is placing a significant medical burden on society and affecting the quality of life of people in Virginia and throughout the world. The complexity of obesity requires an interdisciplinary research agenda that I have embraced and made the foundation of my program while maintaining a commitment to rigorous disciplinary work. Objective 1 & 2 & 4. The inter-disciplinary household production model with parent-child interaction developed in this project is an economic framework to transform complex human behaviors into a simplified representation of reality. For example, within a family structure, this framework allows spouses to jointly decide resource allocation (including money and time) and allows children to influence the household decision-making. This framework is flexible enough to consider health outcomes of household members and include different social and physical environmental stimuli during the process. Different disciplines (such as sociology, psychology, and biology) can be integrated through home, school, and work environment channels into a cohesive system that enables the investigation of interdisciplinary hypotheses and the identification of causal pathways to shed light on policy relevant questions (such as what to target and how it works). The framework is versatile and has broad applicability and has been used, modified and adapted in different research areas and objective 2 and 4 were fulfilled along the way. Three published peer-review journal papers have been based on this model to provide empirical specification guidance and one book was published specifically on this model development. One of the published papers won the Best Economic Paper Award from the Food Safety and Nutrition Section of Agricultural & Applied Economic Association. This objective also produced two Ph.D. dissertations and one of them not only won the competitive dissertation fellowship from RIDGE center at Mississippi State University but also won the Honorable Mention Award in the Outstanding Dissertation in Social Sciences, Business, Education and Humanities category from the Graduate Schoolat Virginia Tech. The theoretical framework helps to harmonize different disciplinary factors into one model that facilitates more thorough empirical policy analysis. One study aided by the model was able to directly test the previous empirical conclusion that mothers’ labor force participation causes household resource allocations to favor the unhealthy weight development in children (i.e., decreasing mothers’ food-at-home preparation time). The study found that these negative influences on household resource allocations do not carry over to children’s health outcomes (i.e., parental childcare time instead of food preparation time, is shown to be the significant factors in the children’s weight outcomes). Another study aided by the model was able to show that contrary to the conventional wisdom, the primary childcare time of parents (e.g., when the parents’ main attention is on the child) is not marginally more important than the secondary childcare time (e.g., when the parents are multi-tasking (distracted) while caring for the child) and paternal childcare time is especially important for children aged 9 to 11. Results inform the policies that encourage family time and identify the vital age range to target. The findings are not possible without a model that allows individual household member to have different influences in household decision-making and allows social and psychological effects on their behaviors. The model was also used in school meal program evaluations. Our study indicated that programs targeting child weight could potentially have positive spillover effects on academic performance leading to the question of what can be done to mitigate the problem. Objective 3. This line of the research is very productive due to its direct policy relevance. During the five-year project period, it has produced 12 peer-reviewed journal papers ranging from economics journal to interdisciplinary journals. One of the papers was featured on www.MDLinx.com (the world’s most up-to-date index of articles that matter in the daily lives of physicians and other health care professionals). Another paper's findings were featured in the Food Thought Blog of the Food Industry Center of University of Minnesota. An NIH funded project has also been completed on this topic that examines the financial incentive design for improving weight control programs’ participation and representativeness. Several working papers are in preparation for peer-review journal submission. The project was also highlighted by the International Innovation Research Spotlight. Two Ph.D. dissertations and three Masters’ thesis were produced and one of the Ph.D. graduates is working as an assistant professor. Along the road of examining tradeoffs betweencost and time,the projectset tounderstand low-income overweight and obese patients’ preference towards incentivized weight control programs my findings, and it alsodemonstrated the need to tailor incentives within weight loss programs and that one-size-fits-all program will not reach those populations that are most in need. More specifically, results revealed that amore flexible payment form (e.g., cash instead of gym membership) and more immediate reward (right after each weigh-ins instead of at the end of the 3-month) will result in higher participation with lower costs. The research that examines the time and cost tradeoffs directly has demonstrated that time is more constraining than money in reaching the SNAP nutrition goals and therefore ignoring the time needed in producing healthy home-cooked meals could undermine the SNAP program effectiveness. Furthermore, another paper answered policy questions regardingthe Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program (EFNEP). The results indicated that there are generally no major inherent participant characteristic biases affecting the effectiveness of the EFNEP and the majority of regions and states show statistically constant returns to scale in two of the three outcome indexes and 13 states show increasing returns to scale in one index. Another study under this objective contributed to the policy debate about placing restrictions on what can be purchased using SNAP benefits. I examined the feasibility of those proposed modifications using economic incentive theory. The findings showed that effective nutrition education and policies that improve food accessibility and affordability are still needed beyond these proposed program changes in order to achieve the program’s nutrition goal. Under all four objectives, numerous dissemination outputs besides journal articles were also produced including invited 7 seminars, 36 conference presentations, 24 poster presentations and one workshop talk. Meanwhile, a productive and effective collaboration relationship has been established among thePI of this Hatch project and faculty members in the Department of Human Nutrition, Food, and Exercise as well asCarilion physicians. The collaboration has lead to four successfully awarded NIH grants. My research program accomplishment was further recognized by the Gamma Sigma Delta Faculty Research Award in Virginia Tech.
Publications
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2013
Citation:
Davis, G.C., and W. You. (senior authorship shared) Estimates of Returns to Scale, Elasticity of Substitution, and the Thrifty Food Plan Meal Poverty Rate from A Direct Household Meal Production Function Food Policy 43(2013):204-212.
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2013
Citation:
Baral, R., G.C. Davis, W. You. National, Regional, and State-Level Estimates of Returns to Scale in the Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program. Journal of Agricultural & Applied Economics 45(2013):203-216.
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2013
Citation:
Capogrossi*, K., and You, W. Academic Performance and Childhood Misnourishment: A Quantile Approach. Journal of Family and Economic Issues 34(2013):141-156.
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2013
Citation:
Baral, R., G.C. Davis, S. Blake, W. You, and E. Serrano. Utilizing National Data to Estimate Average Cost Effectiveness of EFNEP Outcomes by State/Territory. Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior. 45(2013): 183-187.
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2013
Citation:
Zoellner, J., Cook, E., Chen, Y., You, W., Davy, B., Estabrooks, P. Mixed methods evaluation of a randomized control pilot trial targeting sugar-sweetened beverage behaviors. Open Journal of Preventive Medicine. 3(2013): 51-57.
|
Progress 10/01/11 to 09/30/12
Outputs
OUTPUTS: Research Outputs: The inter-disciplinary household production model with parent-child interaction developed in this project continues to produce policy-relevant research output. One Ph.D. student under my guidance graduated at the end of 2011 and based her dissertation study on this theoretical model. Her dissertation aims at systematically examining the impact of the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) and School Breakfast Program (SBP) on children's health and academic performance. Her job market paper received great interests and highly positive feedbacks. The student and I have published the first paper out of this dissertation in the Journal of Family and Economic Issues that examines the heterogeneous child weight impacts along different academic performance levels. The second paper is under preparation for submission to Journal of Health Economics. Several dissemination outputs were produced out of the dissertation study: one poster presentation in national conference, one workshop presentation in USDA-sponsored national workshop, and one invited-seminar presentation at University of Wisconsin-Madison. The proposed goal of understanding what motivates certain behavior is further advanced by the funded NIH R21 project. We have successfully finished the data collection. The male and low-income populations are well represented in the data set, which bridges the gap in the current literature. Currently we are in the data analysis stage and will submit three abstracts for the upcoming International Health Economics Association World Congress. I also started a new topic in the area of incentive design to examine the incentives needed for retailers to promote healthy eating. The work has produced one paper presentation in the national conference in July 2011 and was well received. Meanwhile, a productive and effective collaboration relationship has been established between PI of this Hatch project and faculty members in the Department of Human Nutrition, Food, and Exercise. The collaboration has led to a successfully awarded NIH R18 grant that examines the reach and effectiveness of technology-enhanced diabetes prevention programs. Teaching Outputs: The PhD field course, Food and Health Macroeconomics, taught in Fall 2011 had resulted in five papers on health-related topics accepted and presented at national conferences under my guidance and these papers are currently in preparation for journal submission. I was awarded the Teacher of the Week by Virginia Tech Center for Instructional Development and Educational Research in 2011. PARTICIPANTS: Wen You (PI). Partner organizations include the USDA-ERS, Department of Human Nutrition, Foods, and Exercise at VT, VT Center for Translational Obesity Research, and Carilion Clinic. TARGET AUDIENCES: Academic researchers, government policy makers, general public, public health educators. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: Nothing significant to report during this reporting period.
Impacts
The school meal program evaluation study published assesses whether and how child weight impacts academic performance, particularly those students who are at the lower end of the academic performance distribution. The inter-disciplinary theoretical model allows the household production to display a nested production process: the child's health outcome production is nested within the child's cognitive production function. This takes into account the simultaneity between weight and cognitive outcomes. This framework guides the causality identification and allows us to find that child weight exhibits heterogeneous impact: i.e., it affects lower performing students more and impacts different ethnicity and race groups differently. Results indicate that programs targeting child weight could potentially have positive spillover effects on academic performance leading to the question of what can be done to mitigate the problem. Furthermore, the dissertation further examines the impact of the school meal programs on child weight using a simultaneous multiple treatment analysis controlling for self-selection into the school meal programs to allow causality investigation. Results provide much needed information for a thorough program evaluation on school meal programs. Another evaluation paper published this year answers policy questions regarding to the Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program (EFNEP). The results indicate that there are generally no major inherent participant characteristic biases affecting the effectiveness of the EFNEP and the majority of regions and states show statistically constant returns to scale in two of the three outcome indexes and 13 states show increasing returns to scale in one index. The PI of this project is currently a lead PI for one NIH grant and co-PI for three NIH grants. All these projects are contributing to the goal of this Hatch project in that they are all investigating effective ways to encourage healthy lifestyle adaptation and maintenance.
Publications
- Capogrossi, K., and You, W. 2013. Academic performance and childhood misnourishment: A quantile approach. Journal of Family and Economic Issues. DOI: 10.1007/s10834-012-9315-2.
- Baral, R., Davis, G.C., Blake, S., You, W., and Serrano, E. 2013. Utilizing national data to estimate average cost effectiveness of EFNEP outcomes by state/territory. Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior.
- You, W., P.D. Mitchell, and R. Nayga. 2012 Improving Food Choices Among Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Recipients. Health Economics 21: 852-864.
- Zoellner, J., P. Estabrooks, B. Davy, Y. Chen, and W. You. 2012. Exploring the Theory of Planned Behavior to Explain Sugar-Sweetened Beverage Consumption. Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior 44: 172-177.
- Ferguson, K., Davy, B., Zoellner, J., You, W., Nsiah-Kumi, P. 2011. Demographic factors and beverage consumption patterns: Health literacy, education and income level. The Digest, Research Dietetic Practice Group, Summer-Fall. Vol 47. No.1.
- Boyle, K., Davis, G.C., Estabrooks, P., Good, D., King-Casas, B., Marathe, A., You, W. 2011. Translational economic research: Integrating genetics, neurosciences and behavioral sciences. Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, AERE newsletter. Vol 31. No.1.
|
Progress 10/01/10 to 09/30/11
Outputs
OUTPUTS: After the publication of the inter-disciplinary theoretical model last year, this model has been providing theoretical support for several on-going works. The paper was awarded the Outstanding Economics paper by the Food Safety and Nutrition Section of the profession (Agricultural and Applied Economic Association) in July 2011. One Ph.D. student is working on three papers that will systematically examine the impact of the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) and School Breakfast Program (SBP) on children's health and academic performance. This dissertation study also won the Doctoral Dissertation Research Grant from the RIDGE Center for Targeted Studies at the Southern Rural Development Center at Mississippi State University. The first paper of the dissertation is under review in the Journal of Family and Economic Issues. One paper using the model has been published in the Journal of Family and Economic Issues in 2011. Another working paper that is using the model will soon be sent out for journal peer review which is examining how the model aided by a new econometric technique can help further the quest towards understanding the mechanism behind childhood obesity. One of the goals of this Hatch project is to better understand what motivates certain behavior and how people react to different incentives. This goal has been advanced greatly this past year. An NIH R21 grant that aims to understand how different groups of people respond to different aspects of financial and non-financial incentives in terms of weight control program participation decisions has been awarded. One Ph.D. dissertation will be produced out of this project. Currently, the project is in the data collection stage. The pilot study prior to the award of the grant has produced three working papers which are in the process of being prepared for journal review. One invited seminar talk was given in Texas A&M University. A paper that examines the incentive contract design of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program to improve the welfare of the low-income population has been published in Health Economics in 2011. The money-time threshold project has been successfully completed. The third paper out of this project is under review. A government report has been submitted. The first paper out of the worksite weight loss program funded by an NIH R01 was published in 2011. Meanwhile, a productive and effective collaboration has been established between the PI of this Hatch project and faculty members in the Department of Human Nutrition, Foods, and Exercise. The collaboration has lead to another awarded NIH R01, and a third R01 grant will be awarded in 2012. All of these projects focus on the theme of understanding the barriers to successful weight control and how to develop more effective interventions to help improve the public health. The PhD field course, Food and Health Macroeconomics, has been successfully taught for the first time in Fall 2011. This course provides a good platform for fostering interests among young scholars in this line of research. PARTICIPANTS: Wen You (PI). Partner organizations include the USDA-ERS, Department of Human Nutrition, Food, and Exercise at VT, VT Center for Translational Obesity Research, and Carilion Clinic. TARGET AUDIENCES: Academic researchers, government policy makers, general public, public health educators. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: Not relevant to this project.
Impacts
The AJAE paper was recognized as the Outstanding Economics Paper in July 2011 which recognizes the quality and significance of the work. Another paper using this model has been published in Journal of Family and Economic Issue. This study finds that, on the contrary to the conventional wisdom, the primary childcare time is not marginally more important than the secondary childcare time and paternal childcare time is especially important for young children. Furthermore, if parents of overweight children adopt the time inputs of parents of healthy weight children, the predicted overweight probability decreases by approximately 15% on average, ceteris paribus. If either one of the parents is completely uninvolved, the overweight probability increases by approximately 21% on average, ceteris paribus. In the line of research on the incentives, one paper was published in Health Economics. The study uses a principal-agent framework to examine the feasibility of two proposed modifications to the SNAP program with the goal of encouraging healthier food choices among program participants. Specifically, the paper analyzes two types of contracts. The restricted contract did not allow the purchase of unhealthy foods with program benefits, but compensated participants by increasing total benefits. The incentive contract provided increased benefits that varied according to the percentage of healthy foods purchased with program benefits. The theoretical results revealed the mechanisms for the two alternative contracts, the conditions under which each would be effective, and the key empirical questions to be examined for future policy analysis. This paper was featured on MDLinx.com that is the world's most up-to-date index of articles that matter in the daily lives of physicians and other healthcare professionals. The first paper of the worksite weight loss program project has been published in BMC Public Health. The paper describes and illustrates a method for directly assessing the reach and representativeness of an internet-based worksite weight loss program. The study concludes that worksite weight loss programs should include targeted marketing strategies to engage employees with lower income, education, and health literacy. One paper published in Economic Letters this year is the product of the research on household production and food consumption. The study shows analytically that the goods-time elasticity of substitution will be greater if consumption time is not included as an input. The interdisciplinary collaboration has lead to one NIH funded R01 project. The first paper out of this collaboration is published in Journal of American Dietetic Association (one of the featured papers on that issue). The paper evaluates health literacy skills in relation to Healthy Eating Index scores and sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) consumption while accounting for demographic variables. The second paper is published in Journal of Nutrition and Education Behavior and describes SSB consumption and establishes psychometric properties and utility of a Theory of Planned Behavior instrument for SSB consumption.
Publications
- You, W., and G.C. Davis. 2011. "Childhood overweight: Does quality of parental childcare time matter" Journal of Family and Economic Issues 32:219-232.
- Zoellner, J., W. You, C. Connell, R.L. Smith-Ray, K. Allen, K.L. Tucker, B.M. Davy, and P.A. Estabrooks. 2011. "Health literacy is associated with Healthy Eating Index scores and sugar-sweetened beverage intake: Findings from the rural lower Mississippi Delta." Journal of American Dietetic Association 111:1012-1020.
- You, W., P.D. Mitchell, and R. Nayga. 2011. "Improving Food Choices Among Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Recipients." Health Economics DOI:10.1002/hec.1758 (in press).
- Baral, R., G.C. Davis, and W. You. 2011. "Consumption Time in Household Production: Implications for the Goods-Time Elasticity of Substitution." Economics Letters 112: 138-140.
- Zoellner, J., P. Estabrooks, B. Davy, Y. Chen, and W. You. 2011. "Exploring the Theory of Planned Behavior to Explain Sugar-Sweetened Beverage Consumption." Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior (in press).
- Davis, G.C., and W. You. "Not enough money or not enough time to satisfy the Thrifty Food Plan A cost difference approach for estimating a money-time threshold." 2011. Food Policy 36: 101-107.
- You, W., F.A. Almeida, J.M. Zoellner, J.L. Hill, C.A. Pinard, K.C. Allen, R.E. Glasgow, L.A. Linnan, and P.A. Estabrooks. 2011. "Who Participates in Internet-Based Worksite Weight Loss Programs" BMC Public Health 11:709. Open access at: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2458/11/709.
|
Progress 10/01/09 to 09/30/10
Outputs
OUTPUTS: After the completion of the USDA cooperative agreement in last year, one proposal has been submitted to USDA Food and Nutrition Assistance Programs (FANRP) to seek funding support to further investigate how to improve the welfare of the low-income adults and children through improving the effectiveness and adaptability of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). The project is proposing to use Thrifty Food Program (TFP) model framework to conduct response surface analysis to assess the sensitivity of the nutrient demands and the diet costs with response to the constraints facing the low-income population such as time and food availability and regional food price differences. The project proposed will also team up with extension agents and utilize the mental accounting from behavioral theory to develop practical outreach tools and materials that will educate low income groups to better use their resources for their intended purposes such as food security and healthy eating. The inter-disciplinary theoretical model has been published in the top ranked journal of the field. This model is now providing theoretical support for several on-going work. One research topic is on thoroughly examining the impact of children participation in the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) and School Breakfast Program (SBP) on their health and investigating the incentive gaps for schools to adhere to the program requirements. One Ph.D. dissertation will be produced on this topic. One USDA FANRP grant proposal was submitted to seek funding support for this work and one National Institute of Health (NIH) grant proposal on this topic is in preparation. One invited seminar was given on the model in University of Minnesota. One journal paper using the model has been accepted for publication in 2011. The money-time threshold project is in the final report writing phase. Two journal publications have been produced this year. The NIH R21 proposal that aims at conducting formal economic evaluation on the effective incentive schemes of a basic weight loss program underwent a second round of resubmission and received a good score and percentile ranking this year. This proposal is highly likely to be funded by NIH in the beginning of 2011. The pilot study is in the result dissemination phase. Two journal papers are in preparation. The work-site weight loss program funded by an NIH R01 has one paper in preparation for journal submission and another one in data analysis stage. Meanwhile, a good collaboration relationship has been established between PI and faculty members in the Department of Human Nutrition, Food, and Exercise. Three inter-disciplinary grant proposals were submitted (two to NIH and one to USDA). The PhD field course titled "Food and Health Macroeconomics" has been approved by the university and will be taught in the Fall 2011. This course will provide introduction to policy and intervention design and evaluation, including review of basic nutrition, contract theory and applications, intervention outcome metrics, non-market evaluation, empirical cost effectiveness analysis and treatment effect estimations. PARTICIPANTS: Wen You (PI). Partner organizations include the USDA-ERS, Department of Human Nutrition, Food, and Exercise at VT, VT Center for Translational Obesity Research, and Carilion Clinic. TARGET AUDIENCES: Academic researchers, government policy makers, general public, public health educators. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: Not relevant to this project.
Impacts
Two papers are published this year from the USDA money-time threshold project. One paper is published in Journal of Nutrition. The study uses a basic labor economics technique to value labor in a home food production scenario that is required to reach the TFP nutrition and budget targets and calculates the total cost (inclusive of labor) associated with the TFP. This TFP consistent total cost is then compared, using several metrics, with the total cost associated with actual choices made by those families sharing the same profiles as current SNAP participants. Once labor is included, we find the TFP is not very thrifty and the mean household falls short of the TFP guidelines even with "adequate" monetary resources. Another paper is published in Food Policy. This paper uses a cost difference approach to develop a money-time threshold, and several related metrics, to determine whether money or time is the most limiting resource in reaching the TFP target. In our empirical analysis we find that when time is ignored, single headed households spend on average 35 percent more than required to meet the TFP target. However, when time is included, these households spend on average 40 percent less than required to meet the TFP target. In addition, we find that when time is ignored, 62 percent of single headed households on average spend enough money to reach the TFP target, but when time is included, only 13 percent of single headed households spend enough on average to reach the TFP target. Our empirical results suggest that time is more constraining than money in reaching the TFP target. These results imply that metrics solely focusing on money could severely underestimate the gap between actual expenditures and those required to reach the TFP target. One paper on the topic of value-added product is published in Food Quality and Preference. This study uses experimental economic techniques to explore consumers' preferences between conventional beef and grass-fed beef, and their willingness to pay for grass-fed beef. Our analysis shows that palatability attributes play a central role in determining consumers' preferences and Willingness-to-pay (WTP). We also find that consumers' nutrition knowledge, beef consumption behavior, health condition, living alone status and household size have significant impacts on consumers' WTP for grass-fed beef. The pilot study and the R21 proposed project on economic analysis of financial incentives in weight loss program fill the gaps in the literature that no systematic economic study ever been done in choosing the incentive designs. The research will be the first study to formally evaluate, within an economic framework, the potential effectiveness of the magnitude, type, and timing of financial incentives in stimulating sustained weight loss in overweight and obese adults, on the platform of a minimal weight loss program, and concurrently investigate the interplay between intrinsic motivation and participant perceptions of different aspects of the financial incentives.
Publications
- 3. You, W., and G.C. Davis. "Household Food Expenditures, Parental Time Allocation, and Childhood Overweight: An Integrated Two-Stage Collective Model with an Empirical Application and Test." American Journal of Agricultural Economics. 92(2010):859-872.
- 4. Davis, G.C., W. You. "The Thrifty Food Plan is not Thrifty when Labor Cost is Considered" Journal of Nutrition. 140(2010):854-857.
- 5. Davis, G.C., and W. You. "The Time Cost of Food at Home: General and Food Stamp Participant Profiles." Applied Economics. 42(2010):2537-2552.
- 1. Davis, G.C., and W. You. "Not enough money or not enough time to satisfy the Thrifty Food Plan A cost difference approach for estimating a money-time threshold." Food Policy (in press 2010).
- 2. Hong, X., D. Manville, W. You, and R. Nayga. "Consumer Preferences and Willingness to Pay for Grass-Fed Beef: Empirical Evidence from In-Store Experiments." Food Quality and Preference. 21(2010): 857-866.
|
Progress 10/01/08 to 09/30/09
Outputs
OUTPUTS: The inter-disciplinary theoretical model development project has moved forward with one journal publication and several seminar and conference presentations as result dissemination. The project supported by a USDA cooperative agreement has been completed. The project goal is to modify the nonlinear mathematical programming models that USDA Thrifty Food Plan (TFP) is based on to include food away from home (FAFH) dimension in order to improve adaptability of the TFP and still meet the nutrition and budget goals. A paper based on this project has been published. The project is moving forward towards seeking Extension agents' assistance in developing useful education messages on making healthy food away from home choices. A data set that contains regional food prices and is usable for TFP models has been set up and will be used to assess the impact of regional price differences on TFP efficacy. A project that aims at estimating money-time threshold and accessing the effect of time dimension on the efficacy of the Thrifty Food Plan is well underway. The first phase of the project has been completed with several papers in preparation for submission and several seminar and conference presentations been delivered. An NIH R21 revision was submitted to request funding for conducting formal economic evaluation on the effective incentive schemes of a basic weight loss program. A pilot study following the similar direction is currently in the data collection phase. The worksite weight loss program funded by an NIH R01 is underway and the preliminary data has been analyzed. A paper is in preparation to submit to the Journal of Public Health with the results of the program reach and representativeness. PARTICIPANTS: Wen You (PI). Partner organizations include the USDA-ERS, CNPP, and VT Center for Translational Obesity Research. TARGET AUDIENCES: Academic researchers, government policy makers, general public, public health educators. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: Not relevant to this project.
Impacts
The paper from the inter-disciplinary theoretical model development project has been accepted by the American Journal of Agricultural Economics and will be in press next year. This paper, titled "Household Food Expenditures, Parental Time Allocation, and Childhood Overweight: An Integrated Two-Stage Collective Model with an Empirical Application and Test", develops a two-stage collective household production model for household food expenditures, parental time allocation, and childhood overweight. The model fills four gaps in the literature: a. the "black box" treatment of intrahousehold decision making, b. exclusion of the child's decision input, c. exclusion of noneconomic variables, d. absence of theory-supported instrument identification. The traditional unitary household production model with children is a special case of the model developed. There are important differences in the policy implications to be drawn from both models based on the data set used. This paper reveals that the unitary and collective models showed many differences in the input demands than in the child's BMI which suggests that targeting welfare policies toward mothers may be less important for child overweight than indicated by simply examining the mother's impact on input demands. The policy implications from the two models are radically different. The unitary model either misses or overestimates significant relationships, and does not identify important spillover effects. The paper from the USDA project, titled "Food Consumed Away from Home can Be a Part of a Healthy and Affordable Diet", is published in Journal of Nutrition. The paper evaluates the feasibility and nutritional impact of adding a food away from home (FAFH) dimension into the TFP model framework. Measures of energy density, nutrients and food group composition, and the overall diet quality measured by the Healthy Eating Index 2005 were calculated and compared across the TFP, the TFP with FAFH, and low-income consumers' diet pattern. Results indicated that considering moderate FAFH in the TFP yielded similar nutrient and food group composition as the original TFP while greatly increasing the practicality and adaptability of the recommended dietary pattern. This paper is a multidisciplinary paper that is directly relevant to low income group welfare improvement. Results show that the FAFH dimension adds flexibility into the recommendation and may improve its likelihood of adoption. Therefore, instead of merely suggesting that FAFH is "bad," effective interventions should consider incorporating FAFH in advice about healthy food choices. Nutrition educators may find this information useful for developing messages about FAFH food choices. The Master thesis based on this project has won the William Preston Society Golden Watch Thesis Award which is awarded to the master thesis that presents an original idea with the most potential to benefit all people. The ongoing research on money-time threshold also contributes in improving current food assistance program's efficacy. The pilot study and the R21 proposal on economic analysis of financial incentives benefit the design of better interventions.
Publications
- You, W., and G.C. Davis. "Household Food Expenditures, Parental Time Allocation, and Childhood Overweight: An Integrated Two-Stage Collective Model with an Empirical Application and Test." American Journal of Agricultural Economics(forthcoming, 2010).
- You, W., G. Zhang, B.M. Davy, A. Carlson, B.H. Lin. "Food Consumed Away from Home Can Be a Part of a Healthy and Affordable Diet." Journal of Nutrition 139(2009): 1994-1999.
- Davis, G.C., and W. You. "The Time Cost of Food at Home: General and Food Stamp Participant Profiles." Applied Economics, 2009 (in press: http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a909727327).
|
Progress 10/01/07 to 09/30/08
Outputs
OUTPUTS: Research program was initiated to examine how real-life constraints impact consumers' daily choices and consequently their obesity-related health outcomes, and how policy and intervention programs can be more effective at motivating and maintaining desirable behavior changes. An inter-disciplinary theoretical model that provides theoretical guidance for the research program was developed and refined. The theoretical model incorporates non-economic variables (e.g., work-to-home stress spillover and parental role model etc.) into an economic framework. It provides theoretical guidance for empirical work in terms of what variables to include and how. A book was published on the details of the developed theoretical model. Another important component of this research program is time use research because time is an important and scarce resource of consumers and considering its impact on decision making will shed lights to effective policy design. A paper was co-authored (and now in press) on estimates of the time cost in food preparation at home in U.S. A study was initiated to modify the nonlinear mathematical programming models that USDA Thrifty Food Plan (TFP) is based on. The purpose of the study is to examine the impact of considering away-from-home food consumption dimension on the proposed low cost nutritious food plan. Data has been generated on away-from-home food's nutrient profile and the current low income population food away from home consumption pattern. It was found that the new plan is easier for the current consumers to adapt because it respects their constraints of time and human capital while still meets the nutritious diet standards. The limited price data on away from home food limits the conclusion of the costs. A study was initiated to examine the cost effectiveness of a worksite internet weight loss intervention program. Data collection in 20 worksites is in process. An NIH R21 proposal was submitted to request funding for conducting formal economic evaluation on the effective incentive schemes of a basic weight loss program. PARTICIPANTS: Wen You (PI). Partner organizations include the USDA-ERS, CNPP, and VT Center for Translational Obesity Research TARGET AUDIENCES: Academic researchers, government policy makers, general public, public health educators. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: Not relevant to this project.
Impacts
Research to examine how consumers make behavioral choices can help identify the essential factors influencing the obesity-related health outcome production. Results will help inform policy makers in designing effective public intervention and welfare policies. Results can also justify the modification of the current food assistance programs and their nutrition education programs to better reflect real-life constraints and be more effective in changing behaviors and sustaining the changes. The research project that modifies the current TFP plan will have direct impact on low-income population's welfare, especially those working low-income families and single-parent families who are facing tightening time constraints.
Publications
- Davis, G.C., and W. You. The Time Cost of Food at Home: General and Food Stamp Participant Profiles. Applied Economics, 2008 (in press).
- You, W. Time Well Spent: How Watching Time can Reduce the Chances of Having Overweight Children. VDM Verlag Dr. Muller. ISBN: 978-3-8364-3926-8. May 2008.
|
|