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Background: Food prepared away from home has become increasingly popular to U.S. families, and may contribute to obesity. Sales have been dominated by fast food outlets, where meals are purchased for dining away from home or in the home. Although national chain affiliated fast-food outlets are considered the main source for fast food, fast foods are increasingly available in convenience stores and supermarkets/grocery stores. In rural areas, these nontraditional fast-food outlets may provide most of the opportunities for procurement of fast foods.

Background: The purpose of the Texas!Grow!Eat!Go! (TGEG) study was to assess individual and combined effects of schoolbased gardening and physical activity (PA) interventions on children's eating and PA behaviors and obesity status. Methods: Using a 2 • 2 design, 28 low-income schools in Texas were randomized to 1 of 4 conditions: (1) School Garden intervention (Learn!Grow!Eat!Go! [LGEG]), (2) PA intervention (Walk Across Texas [WAT!]), (3) both Garden and PA intervention (Combined), or (4) neither Garden nor PA intervention (Control). Participants included 1326 third grade students and parents (42% Hispanic; 78% free/reduced lunch). Student and parent data were collected at the beginning and end of the school year. Two different sets of analyses measuring pre-post changes in outcomes within and across conditions were estimated by factorial ANOVAs using mixed models adjusted for demographics. Results: Main effect analyses indicate that relative to children at schools that did not receive LGEG, children at schools that received LGEG, either individually or in combination with WAT!, showed significant increases in Nutrition knowledge, Vegetable preference, and Vegetable tasted (p < 0.001 in all cases). Within-group analyses show that compared to Comparison, children in the WAT! group significantly increased in the amount of time parents and children were active together (p = 0.038). In addition, children in LGEG and WAT! schools significantly decreased BMI percentile (p = 0.042, p = 0.039, respectively), relative to children in Comparison schools. Conclusions: Both the garden and PA interventions independently produced significant changes related to healthy lifestyle behaviors. However, combining the two interventions did not show greater impact than the single interventions, underscoring the need for more research to determine how to better implement comprehensive interventions at schools.

BackgroundMany complex and subtle aspects relating to mothers and food choice are not well understood. Mothers play a primary role in their children's food choices, but research has not specifically examined how matrilineal family members who do not reside in the same household, such as a mother's mother, aunt, or grandmother, influence the current family's food choices.MethodsSeven participants were recruited from the Household Food Inventory (HFI) Study in the Bryan/College Station, Texas. All participants completed an in-depth interview, photographed food-related activities, and discussed photographs in a follow-up in-depth interview. Interviews were transcribed verbatim from audio recordings. Transcripts were analyzed using several qualitative approaches including grounded theory to identify themes and subthemes.ResultsParticipants discussed the following themes relating to the influence of their mother or other female relation (Mom) on their families' food choices: Relationship with Mom, Just like Mom, 'Kinda' like Mom, Different than Mom, and Mom's Influence on Children's Food Choices. Overall, participants used the photographs to illustrate how they were similar or different to their mothers, or other female family member, as well as how their mothers either supported or undermined control over their children's food choices. The "Mom effect" or matrilineal influence of mothers, aunts, and grandmothers on a mother's food choices was omnipresent, even though Mom was no longer living with the participants.ConclusionsWe found a matrilineal influence to have a residual and persistent influence on a family's food choices. This finding may be helpful for understanding the contextual elements of food choice and explaining why it is sometimes difficult to change mothers' food habits.

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