Snack It Up for Parents: Interventions to Improve Children's Snacks (SIU4P)

Influencing children's snacking habits has the potential to reap long-term rewards, yet few studies have focused on helping parents to provide healthier snacks for their children. The study tested the feasibility and preliminary effectiveness of parent interventions to improve snacks for children ages 8-12.

Study Overview

• Status: Completed
• Conditions: Snacking
• Intervention / Treatment: Behavioral: Incentive; Behavioral: Education; Behavioral: Combined

Detailed Description

Objective. Influencing children's snacking habits has the potential to reap long-term rewards, yet few studies have focused on helping parents to provide healthier snacks for their children. The study tested the feasibility and preliminary effectiveness of parent interventions to improve snacks for children ages 8-12.

Methods. Parents of children enrolled in an out-of-school-time soccer program in a low-income school district (n 16) were recruited. A comparison of 3 randomly-assigned interventions was conducted: 4 parents received grocery store gift cards (Incentive); 7 received nutrition education videos with tip sheets (Education); and 5 received both (Combined). The interventions were assessed qualitatively by interviewing parents and quantitatively to determine motivation (psychosocial survey) and children's snack quality (web-based 24-hour recall).

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Actual): 17
• Phase: Not Applicable

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: 18 years and older (Adult, Older Adult)
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No
• Genders Eligible for Study: All

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• 18 year and older
• Must have a child enrolled in one of three designated soccer sites of the study and must agree to let their child take the online 24 hour recall (ASA24)
• Must have a child 7 years or older participating on a soccer team
• Must frequently buy groceries from Stop & Shop (only if recruited for a study arms that involves grocery coupons)
• Must be literate in English or Spanish.

Exclusion Criteria:

• Failure to provide informed consent

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Prevention
• Allocation: Randomized
• Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
• Masking: None (Open Label)

Number of Arms

3

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: Incentive; Each week parents received one $5 grocery store gift card per child in the household, intended for the purchase of healthy snacks, donated to the study by a partnering grocery store	Behavioral: Incentive; $5 grocery gift card
Experimental: Education; Parents received brief weekly nutrition education videos (approximately one minute in length, uploaded on YouTube and viewable on most operating systems and on mobile devices	Behavioral: Education; Video-based brief nutrition education
Experimental: Combined; Parents received both the Incentive and Education arm interventions	Behavioral: Combined; Both Incentive and Education interventions received

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
snack quality by on-line 24-hour dietary recall (ASA24)	grams of sugar, fruits and vegetables as snacks	6 weeks

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Intrinsic motivation by adapted Intrinsic Motivation Inventory	Parent intrinsic motivation for providing fruit and vegetable snacks; questions adapted from the Intrinsic Motivation Inventory (McAuley, E., Duncan, T., & Tammen, V. (1989). Psychometric properties of the Intrinsic Motivation Inventory in a competitive sport setting: A confirmatory factor analysis. Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport, 60(1), 48-58).	6 weeks
Decisional balance by the Mainvil Decisional Balance Scale	Parent pros and cons for providing fruit and vegetable snacks to children; questions adapted from Mainvil decisional balance scale (Mainvil, L. A., Lawson, R., Horwath, C. C., McKenzie, J. E., & Hart, I. (2010). Validated scales to assess adult decisional balance to eat more fruits and vegetables. Appetite, 55(3), 454-465. doi:10.1016/j.appet.2010.08.007)	6 weeks
Self-efficacy by questions adapted NCI Food Attitudes and Behaviors Survey	Parent self-efficacy for providing fruit and vegetable snacks; questions adapted from the self-efficacy questions in the National Cancer Institute's Food Attitudes and Behaviors Survey (Erinosho, T. O., Pinard, C. A., Nebeling, L. C., Moser, R. P., Shaikh, A. R., Resnicow, K., . . . Yaroch, A. L. (2015). Development and implementation of the National Cancer Institute's Food Attitudes and Behaviors Survey to assess correlates of fruit and vegetable intake in adults. PLoS One, 10(2), e0115017. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0115017)	6 weeks

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: Tufts University
• Collaborators: Newman's Own Foundation; Stop & Shop Supermarket Company; Soccer4Success/America SCORES

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Actual): March 1, 2016
• Primary Completion (Actual): August 1, 2016
• Study Completion (Actual): August 1, 2016

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: July 23, 2018
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: September 18, 2018
• First Posted (Actual): September 20, 2018

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): September 20, 2018
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: September 18, 2018
• Last Verified: September 1, 2018

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Keywords: nutrition education; child nutrition; parent intervention
• Other Study ID Numbers: 1601028

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: No

Drug and device information, study documents

• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product: No
• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product: No
• product manufactured in and exported from the U.S.: No