SCHOOL AND COMMUNITY DRIVERS OF CHILD DIETS IN ARAB CITIES: IDENTIFYING LEVERS FOR INTERVENTION (SCALE)

Low and middle-income countries of the Arab region are undergoing a rapid nutrition transition with increases in the prevalence of overweight and obesity among young and adult populations. Although children’s food choices and dietary behaviors are early risk factors for the development of NCDs, research on what influences these behaviors remains scant in the region. School and neighborhood environments have the potential to counter the effect of societal forces on children’s diets, but little is known about the drivers of children’s food choices within these environments and their potential to be used as levers for intervention.

The SCALE study aimed to inform context-specific interventions targeting childhood overweight in the urban settings of Greater Beirut and Greater Tunis, and ultimately to foster the development of food environments that enable healthy eating among children and their families.

The research used gamified choice experiments, geospatial mapping, wearable cameras, and machine learning in combination with nutrition surveys and an economic situation analysis to assess individual diets and the contextual factors that influence children’s food choices. These novel methods aimed to identify moments in the daily lives of children that represent threats to, and opportunities for, healthy eating. These results will inform the development of interventions that influence children diets in Lebanon and Tunisia.

Join us for a 3-part webinar series, where we will discuss key findings of our study and invite exchanges of experiences from different global contexts.

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AGENDA

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More Information AUB – Event – VIRTUAL WEBINAR SERIES