Can adherence to dietary guidelines address excess caloric intake? An empirical assessment for the UK

Abstract

The facilitation of healthier dietary choices by consumers is a key element of government strategies to combat the rising incidence of obesity in developed and developing countries. Public health campaigns to promote healthier eating often target compliance with recommended dietary guidelines for consumption of individual nutrients such as fats and added sugars. This paper examines the association between improved compliance with dietary guidelines for individual nutrients and excess calorie intake, the most proximate determinant of obesity risk. We apply quantile regressions and counterfactual decompositions to cross-sectional data from the National Diet and Nutrition Survey (2000-01) to assess how excess calorie consumption patterns in the UK are likely to change with improved compliance with dietary guidelines. We find that the effects of compliance vary significantly across different quantiles of calorie consumption. Our results show that compliance with dietary guidelines for individual nutrients, even if successfully achieved, is likely to be associated with only modest shifts in excess calorie consumption patterns. Consequently, public health campaigns that target compliance with dietary guidelines for specific nutrients in isolation are unlikely to have a significant effect on the obesity risk faced by the population.

Do the contemporary dietary patterns of children align with national food and nutrient recommendations?

“…The results of the present study show that specific nutrient intakes can be attained without strict alignment with current food group recommendations, with existing studies conducted in other Australian population subgroups concurring with these findings . Partial adherence to dietary guidelines has been shown to have only a modest reduction in energy intake and thus minimal impact on obesity risk . Considering that 31% of children reported excessive estimated energy intakes and no child had complete alignment with all AGHE recommendations, the dietary patterns of Australian children may be considered as currently sub‐optimal.…”

Physical activity, time use, and food intakes of rural households in Ghana, India, and Nepal

“…Gender and age-related differentiation in intra-household allocation decisions have been observed to have an important role in explaining the nutrition impacts of productivity-enhancing innovations in developing country contexts 6 . A key impact pathway to nutrition is the effect of innovations on energy expenditure and energy intakes of individuals 7 , mediated by intra-household allocation decisions. In fact, nutritional outcomes of productivity-enhancing agricultural interventions are determined by the changes in energy intakes facilitated by productivity enhancements -such as mechanization or adoption of new technology -as well as by the changes in energy expenditures called for by the intervention for different members of the rural household.…”

Association between barriers and facilitators to meeting the Dietary Guidelines for Americans and body weight status of caregiver–child dyads: the Healthy Eating and Lifestyle for Total Health Study

“…In 1995, a recommendation was made to use the Healthy Eating Index as a measure of adherence to the DGA (1). Since then, a variety of approaches have been used to assess DGA adherence (55)(56)(57)(58)(59). More studies are needed to obtain scientific proof on how this empirical approach compares with other quantifiable methods.…”