Prevalence and patterns of cooking dinner at home in the USA: National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) 2007–2008

Abstract

Objective: To measure the prevalence of cooking dinner at home in the USA and test whether home dinner preparation habits are associated with socio-economic status, race/ethnicity, country of birth and family structure. Design: Cross-sectional analysis. The primary outcome, self-reported frequency of cooking dinner at home, was divided into three categories: 0-1 dinners cooked per week ('never'), 2-5 ('sometimes') and 6-7 ('always'). We used bivariable and multivariable regression analyses to test for associations between frequency of cooking dinner at home and factors of interest. Setting: The 2007-2008 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES).Subjects: The sample consisted of 10 149 participants. Results: Americans reported cooking an average of five dinners per week; 8 % never, 43 % sometimes and 49 % always cooked dinner at home. Lower household wealth and educational attainment were associated with a higher likelihood of either always or never cooking dinner at home, whereas wealthier, more educated households were more likely to sometimes cook dinner at home (P , 0?05). Black households cooked the fewest dinners at home (mean 5 4?4, 95 % CI 4?2, 4?6). Households with foreign-born reference persons cooked more dinners at home (mean 5 5?8, 95 % CI 5?7, 6?0) than households with US-born reference persons (mean 5 4?9, 95 % CI 4?7, 5?1). Households with dependants cooked more dinners at home (mean 5 5?2, 95 % CI 5?1, 5?4) than households without dependants (mean 5 4?6, 95 % CI 4?3, 5?0). Conclusions: Home dinner preparation habits varied substantially with socioeconomic status and race/ethnicity, associations that likely will have implications for designing and appropriately tailoring interventions to improve home food preparation practices and promote healthy eating.

Public perceptions of cooking and the implications for cooking behaviour in the USA

“…Similar to the results from the present study, perceptions of cooking were primarily based on whether scratch or fresh ingredients were used, the degree of effort or creativity invested if convenience foods were used, and whether or not heat was used (16,38) . Our findings related to cooking frequency are similar to the estimate from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) of 5·0 d/week (10) . However, this general measure of cooking frequency in NHANES masks important differences in more specific cooking practices; the present results indicate that the frequency of using packaged/boxed or frozen products is higher than that of using scratch/fresh ingredients.…”

“…Available evidence suggests that adults in the USA spend less time cooking now than in the past (8,9) . Yet, Americans currently report living in households where dinner is cooked on average five nights per week, with over half cooking dinner six or seven times weekly (10,11) , and almost half of all food dollars are spent on food consumed at home (12) . The literature also suggests that convenience foods ('any fully or partially prepared foods in which significant preparation time, culinary skills or energy inputs have been transferred from the home kitchen to the food processor and distributor' (13) ) have become ubiquitous in the modern diet.…”

“…Cooking is a complex concept that does not have a single agreed upon or 'correct' definition in the literature (16)(17)(18)(19)(20)(21) . In fact, uncertainty about the public's understanding of the meaning of cooking is often cited as a limitation in studies examining the association between cooking skills and cooking behaviours such as home food preparation (9,10,(22)(23)(24) . Greater frequency of cooking at home is associated with consumption of a healthier diet (11) , particularly among higher-income households (25) , and cooking at home is promoted as an obesity prevention measure (26)(27)(28) .…”

Older adults’ household cooking: card sort analyses

“…Older American adults spend slightly more time cooking and cook dinner at home more often than younger adults (Hamrick et al, 2011), with 60 percent of adults age 65+ preparing dinner at home six or seven nights per week, compared to 49 percent of all adults (Virudachalam et al, 2014). Older Americans also prepare about half of their meals from raw or fresh ingredients rather than convenience foods (Sloan, 2015).…”

A influência das habilidades culinárias dos pais na alimentação de crianças em idade escolar

“…Ainda que outros estudos tenham demonstrado associação significativa entre habilidades culinárias e variáveis sociodemográficas, como sexo (CARAHER et al, 1999;LANG;CARAHER, 2001; SIEGRIST, 2011;MORIN et al, 2013;MILLS et al, 2017), raça/cor (VIRUDACHALAM et al, 2014;BERGE et al, 2016), escolaridade, situação de trabalho, número de pessoas na casa (BERGE et al, 2016), renda e estrutura familiar (VIRUDACHALAM et al, 2014), no presente estudo apenas a renda esteve associada ao IHC e, ainda assim, nas análises ajustadas essa associação não se manteve.…”