Dataset Information

Canadians' perceptions of food, diet, and health--a national survey.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Poor nutrition is harmful to one's health as it can lead to overweight and obesity and a number of chronic diseases. Understanding consumer perceptions toward diet and nutrition is critical to advancing nutrition-related population health interventions to address such issues. The purpose of this paper was to examine Canadians' perceived health and diet status, compared to their actual health status, and general concern about their own diet and beliefs about health. Also analyzed were some of the perceived barriers to eating "healthy" foods, with a focus on the availability of "healthy" processed foods.

Methods

Two surveys were administered online to a group of Canadian panelists from all ten provinces during May 2010 to January 2011. Thirty thousand were invited; 6,665 completed the baseline survey and 5,494 completed the second survey. Panelists were selected to be nationally representative of the Canadian adult population by age, sex, province and education level, according to 2006 census data.

Results

Approximately one third of Canadians perceived their health or diet to be very good while very few Canadians perceived their health or diet to be very poor. While the majority of Canadians believed food and nutrition to be very important for improving one's health, fewer Canadians were concerned about their own diets. The majority of Canadians reported difficulty finding "healthy" processed foods (low in salt and sugar and with sufficient vitamins and minerals). Many also reported difficulty finding healthy foods that are affordable.

Conclusion

Although consumers believe that nutrition is one of the most important factors for maintaining health, there are still a number of attitudinal and perceived environmental barriers to healthy eating.

SUBMITTER: Schermel A

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3900450 | biostudies-literature | 2014

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

Canadians' perceptions of food, diet, and health--a national survey.

Schermel Alyssa A Mendoza Julio J Henson Spencer S Dukeshire Steven S Pasut Laura L Emrich Teri E TE Lou Wendy W Qi Ying Y L'abbé Mary R MR

PloS one 20140123 1

<h4>Background</h4>Poor nutrition is harmful to one's health as it can lead to overweight and obesity and a number of chronic diseases. Understanding consumer perceptions toward diet and nutrition is critical to advancing nutrition-related population health interventions to address such issues. The purpose of this paper was to examine Canadians' perceived health and diet status, compared to their actual health status, and general concern about their own diet and beliefs about health. Also analyz ...[more]

PMID: 24465832

Similar Datasets

Project description:Background and objectivesThere is a large number of older of this demographic fact. Although many studies have investigated the association between living arrangements and health, little is known about potential underlying mechanisms regarding how living alone may predict older Canadians' health. In this study, we address this research gap intending to contribute to offering policy suggestions for older Canadians who live alone.Research design and methodsWe applied Cockerham's health lifestyle theory to explore to what degree living alone predicts worse health lifestyles and, further, to what degree these lifestyles can explain the association between living alone and older Canadians' health. We used the 2017-2018 Canadian Community Social Survey (Annual Component) which has a response rate of 58.8%. We focused on respondents aged 60 and above, and the analytical sample size is 39,636.ResultsOlder Canadians living alone are more likely to have food insecurity problems and higher possibilities of smoking cigarettes compared to those living with spouses/partners with or without children. Compared to those living with spouses/partners only, the odds of solo-living older Canadians drinking regularly is significantly lower. There also exists a significant difference between older Canadians living alone and their counterparts living with spouses/partners that the former reported lower self-rated health compared to the latter. Moreover, food insecurity and the three health lifestyle variables are significantly associated with respondents' self-rated health; food insecurity, cigarette smoking, and alcohol drinking can partially explain the difference in self-rated health due to living arrangements.Discussion and implicationsAccording to our findings, health officials are recommended to pay more attention to food insecurity and heavy smoking problems facing older Canadians who live by themselves. Local communities and other stakeholders are suggested to provide older adults living alone with more opportunities for social engagement and involvement since regular drinking may have played such a role in enhancing social life quality of the aged.

Project description:BackgroundSocial isolation measures are requisites to control viral spread during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, if these measures are implemented for a long period of time, they can result in adverse modification of people's health perceptions and lifestyle behaviors.ObjectiveThe aim of this cross-national survey was to address the lack of adequate real-time data on the public response to changes in lifestyle behavior during the crisis of the COVID-19 pandemic.MethodsA cross-national web-based survey was administered using Google Forms during the month of April 2020. The settings were China, Japan, Italy, and India. There were two primary outcomes: (1) response to the health scale, defined as perceived health status, a combined score of health-related survey items; and (2) adoption of healthy lifestyle choices, defined as the engagement of the respondent in any two of three healthy lifestyle choices (healthy eating habits, engagement in physical activity or exercise, and reduced substance use). Statistical associations were assessed with linear and logistic regression analyses.ResultsWe received 3371 responses; 1342 were from India (39.8%), 983 from China (29.2%), 669 from Italy (19.8%), and 377 (11.2%) from Japan. A differential countrywise response was observed toward perceived health status; the highest scores were obtained for Indian respondents (9.43, SD 2.43), and the lowest were obtained for Japanese respondents (6.81, SD 3.44). Similarly, countrywise differences in the magnitude of the influence of perceptions on health status were observed; perception of interpersonal relationships was most pronounced in the comparatively old Italian and Japanese respondents (β=.68 and .60, respectively), and the fear response was most pronounced in Chinese respondents (β=.71). Overall, 78.4% of the respondents adopted at least two healthy lifestyle choices amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Unlike health status, the influence of perception of interpersonal relationships on the adoption of lifestyle choices was not unanimous, and it was absent in the Italian respondents (odds ratio 1.93, 95% CI 0.65-5.79). The influence of perceived health status was a significant predictor of lifestyle change across all the countries, most prominently by approximately 6-fold in China and Italy.ConclusionsThe overall consistent positive influence of increased interpersonal relationships on health perceptions and adopted lifestyle behaviors during the pandemic is the key real-time finding of the survey. Favorable behavioral changes should be bolstered through regular virtual interpersonal interactions, particularly in countries with an overall middle-aged or older population. Further, controlling the fear response of the public through counseling could also help improve health perceptions and lifestyle behavior. However, the observed human behavior needs to be viewed within the purview of cultural disparities, self-perceptions, demographic variances, and the influence of countrywise phase variations of the pandemic. The observations derived from a short lockdown period are preliminary, and real insight could only be obtained from a longer follow-up.

Project description:BackgroundUK adolescents consume fewer fruits and vegetables and more free sugars than any other age group. Established techniques to understand diet quality can be difficult to use with adolescents because of high participant burden. This study aimed to identify key foods that indicate variation in diet quality in UK adolescents for inclusion in a short food frequency questionnaire (FFQ) and to investigate the associations between adolescent diet quality, nutritional biomarkers and socio-demographic factors.MethodsDietary, demographic and biomarker data from waves 1-8 of the National Diet and Nutrition Survey rolling programme were used (n=2587; aged 11-18?years; 50% boys; n=?997 biomarker data). Principal component analysis (PCA) was applied to 139 food groups to identify the key patterns within the data. Two diet quality scores, a 139-group and 20-group, were calculated using the PCA coefficients for each food group and multiplying by their standardised reported frequency of consumption and then summing across foods. The foods with the 10 strongest positive and 10 strongest negative coefficients from the PCA results were used for the 20-group score. Scores were standardised to have a zero mean and standard deviation of one.ResultsThe first PCA component explained 3.0% of variance in the dietary data and described a dietary pattern broadly aligned with UK dietary recommendations. A correlation of 0.87 was observed between the 139-group and 20-group scores. Bland-Altman mean difference was 0.00 and 95% limits of agreement were -?0.98 to 0.98 SDs. Correlations, in the expected direction, were seen between each nutritional biomarker and both scores; results attenuated slightly for the 20-group score compared to the 139-group score. Better diet quality was observed among girls, non-white populations and in those from higher socio-economic backgrounds for both scores.ConclusionsThe diet quality score based on 20 food groups showed reasonable agreement with the 139-group score. Both scores were correlated with nutritional biomarkers. A short 20-item FFQ can provide a meaningful and easy-to-implement tool to assess diet quality in large scale observational and intervention studies with adolescents.

Project description:BackgroundThe Health Information System (HIS) is a set of computerized tools for the collection, storage, management, and transmission of health data. The role of such tools in supporting the modernization of health systems, improving access to quality healthcare, and reducing costs in developing countries is unquestionable, but their implementation faces several challenges. In Gabon, a unique national electronic HIS has been launched. It will connect healthcare institutions and providers at all levels in the whole country.ObjectiveThis study aims to explore and identify the factors influencing healthcare providers' perceptions of the national electronic HIS in Gabon.MethodsA 44-item questionnaire based on the Information System Success Model (ISSM) was administered between February and April 2018 among 2600 healthcare providers across the country. The questions assessed the different aspects of the HIS that could influence its perceived impact on a 5-level Likert scale (from fully agree to totally disagree). The reliability and construct validity of the questionnaire were checked using Cronbach alpha and congeneric reliability coefficients. A logistic regression was used to identify the factors influencing healthcare providers' perceptions of the system.ResultsA total of 2327 questionnaires were completed (i.e. 89.5% response rate). The logistic regression identified five elements that significantly influenced perceived system impact: System Quality (Odds Ratio-OR?=?1.70), Information Quality (OR?=?1.69), Actual Use (OR?=?1.41), Support Quality (OR?=?1.37), and Useful Functions (OR?=?1.14). The model explained 30% of the variance in providers' perception that the national HIS leads to positive impacts.DiscussionThe results show that healthcare providers' perceptions regarding the positive impact of the national HIS in Gabon are influenced by their previous use of an HIS, the scope of their usage, and the quality of the system, information, and support provided to users. These results could inform the development of strategies to ensure adequate change of management and user experience for the implementation of the national HIS in Gabon, and eventually in other low resource environments.

Project description:BackgroundDespite health policy that promotes shared decision-making, it is not yet the norm in clinical practice. We aimed to assess how much shared decision-making Canadians experienced in health-related decisions in 2017.MethodsWe conducted a cross-sectional online survey in January 2018 with a Web-based panel of Canadians representing all 10 provinces. We assessed their involvement in health-related decisions made with a health care professional over the previous year by asking about 1) discussion of choice of treatment or care plan, 2) presentation of advantages and disadvantages, 3) exploration of ideas and preferences, 4) discussion of preferred option and 5) match between preferred and actual level of participation. We computed an average shared decision-making score (range 1 [never] to 5 [always]). We presented characteristics of participants and responses using descriptive statistics and explored variations across sociodemographic factors, jurisdictions, geographical areas and care settings (home care or not) using multivariate weighted regressions.ResultsOf the 1591 participants surveyed, 1010 (63.5%) reported receiving health care in the previous 12 months. The mean of the average shared decision-making score was 2.25/5 (standard deviation [SD] 1.16). After weighting, 42.8% of respondents reported that their health care professional often or always mentioned that they had a choice of treatment or care plan, 45.4% reported that advantages and disadvantages were often or always presented, 38.8% reported that they were often or always asked for their ideas or preferences, 40.2% reported that they were often or always asked about their preferred option, and 54.1% stated that their level of participation in decision-making often or always matched their preferred level of participation. Increasing age, rural setting, living in the province of Quebec and not being white significantly decreased the level of shared decision-making experienced. Older respondents (age ≥ 65 yr) receiving home care reported the least shared decision-making (mean score 1.7 [SD 0.5]).InterpretationCanadians in all 10 provinces experienced a low degree of shared decision-making in 2017, with variations across sociodemographic factors, jurisdictions, care settings and geographical areas. Further efforts to foster implementation of shared decision-making are needed and should take these variations into account.

Dataset Information

Canadians' perceptions of food, diet, and health--a national survey.

Background

Methods

Results

Conclusion

Publications

Canadians' perceptions of food, diet, and health--a national survey.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets