Health Literacy and Nutrition Behaviors among Low-Income Adults

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to explore the relationship between health literacy and nutrition behaviors using a low-income sample. Face-to-face surveys at 11 social services offices generated a convenience sample of 154 Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP)-eligible adults. We assessed health literacy, fruit and vegetable intake, food label use, consumption of healthy foods, and demographic characteristics. Thirty seven percent of the sample had adequate health literacy as measured by the Newest Vital Sign (NVS). Race and parenthood were significantly related to health literacy scores. Adequate health literacy, as measured by the NVS, was associated with frying chicken less often and eating the peels of fresh fruit more often. The findings suggest that health practitioners should ensure nutrition-related messages are accessible to all of their clients, especially those with the lowest health literacy levels.

The Association of Health Literacy with Physical Activity and Nutritional Behavior in Older Adults, and Its Social Cognitive Mediators

“…However, high quality intervention studies are needed to establish causal conclusions. Our finding that the association between health literacy and physical activity is stronger than the association between health literacy and fruit and vegetable consumption is in line with the findings of a recent cross sectional study (Adams et al, 2013) and with a survey study that suggested that adequate health literacy is only weakly associated with healthy eating practices in a low income population (Speirs et al, 2012). This pattern of results suggests that the impact of health literacy varies across different health behaviors.…”

“…However, health behaviors such as physical activity (Brovold, Skelton, & Bergland, 2013;Dhaliwal, Welborn, & Howat, 2013) and fruit and vegetable consumption (Lo, Chang, Wahlqvist, Huang, & Lee, 2012;Södergren, McNaughton, Salmon, Ball, & Crawford, 2012), strongly predict health outcomes. Some crosssectional surveys suggest that inadequate health literacy is associated with health risk behaviors such as smoking, alcohol use, insufficient physical activity, and insufficient fruit and vegetable intake (Adams et al, 2013;Wolf, Gazmararian, & Baker, 2007), but another survey reported only weak associations between adequate health literacy and healthy eating practices (Speirs, Messina, Munger, & Grutzmacher, 2012). Evidence on the association between health literacy and health behaviors is even more limited regarding older adults, despite them being the population with the highest rates of inadequate health literacy (Ashida et al, 2011;von Wagner et al, 2007), and there is even a complete lack of longitudinal evidence for these associations.…”

Examination of Nutrition Literacy and Quality of Self-monitoring in Behavioral Weight Loss

“…Consistent with prior research, NL differed by race, age, and education in this BWL sample(7, 26–29); however, we failed to find significant differences in NL by baseline BMI, as reported elsewhere(6, 7, 26). Regarding dieting history, lower NL was marginally associated with fewer prior weight loss attempts, and less weight lost during past attempts.…”

The health literacy level and eating behaviours of the teachers working at the city center of Eskisehir Turkey

“…8,9 Previous studies revealed that individuals with adequate health literacy were more likely to consume less amount of sugar sweetened beverages and fried meals, good amount of fruit and vegetables with high healthy eating index and better food label use. [10][11][12] The concept of Health Literacy is based on people's access to health information but their capacity to use this knowledge effectively is more important. 4 The skills and practices of teachers play an important role in the implementation of Health Literacy to the students.…”