Nutrition Education and e-Texting to Increase Access to Fresh Produce ((NEAT))

Nutrition Ed, Access and Texting (NEAT): Combining the Hartford Mobile Market With e-Marketing

The proposed project, Nutrition Ed, Access and Texting (NEAT): Combining the Hartford Mobile Market with e-Marketing , uses an e-technology social marketing strategy to promote use of a recently launched mobile produce market among SNAP-Ed recipients. This study will potentially increase fresh produce access and intake by combining an innovative food system change (produce mobile market) with existing SNAP-Ed nutrition education curriculum and the use of e-marketing technology.

Study Overview

• Status: Completed
• Conditions: Healthy Eating
• Intervention / Treatment: Other: Mobile

Detailed Description

The proposed project, Nutrition Ed, Access and Texting (NEAT): Combining the Hartford Mobile Market with e-Marketing uses an e-technology social marketing strategy to promote use of a recently launched mobile produce market among SNAP-Ed recipients. This study will potentially increase fresh produce access and intake by combining an innovative food system change (produce mobile market) with existing SNAP-Ed nutrition education curriculum and the use of e-marketing technology. Thus, the study combines key elements that have been deemed necessary for increasing produce intake among low income communities. The goal of the NEAT study is to assess the impact of a texting-based social marketing campaign on SNAP-Ed participants' access to and purchase of fresh produce on a recently launched mobile produce market, and their subsequent produce intake. Objectives include: 1) Compare the impact of nutrition education alone to nutrition education plus promotional text messaging on purchase of fruits and vegetables; 2) Compare the impact of nutrition education alone to nutrition education plus promotional text messaging on consumption of fruits and vegetables; and 3) Assess the effectiveness of coupon distribution on coupon redemption at a mobile produce market. The NEAT design will be a randomized controlled trial using a pre-post assessment comparing change in behavior. Both intervention and control groups will receive SNAP-Ed education as currently delivered by the Hispanic Health Council. The intervention group will receive additional promotional text messaging related to use of the mobile market. The control group will receive text messaging about free activities taking place at the Hartford Public Library and other community locations. Participants will be interviewed via phone at baseline, then randomized to intervention and control groups, and re-interviewed again 6 weeks after they start receiving the text messages, which it will be 2 weeks after the one-month texting period ends.

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Actual): 200
• Phase: Not Applicable

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: 18 years and older (Adult, Older Adult)
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: Yes
• Genders Eligible for Study: All

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• SNAP eligible participants with children under 5 years old living at home.
• Living in Hartford, CT.
• Having a cell phone with unlimited smart phone data plans.

Exclusion Criteria:

• Not living in Hartford Less than 18 years old

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

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

Number of Arms

2

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: Intervention; The intervention group will receive daily text messages with information on: (i) HMM stop locations and schedule; (ii) information on HMM weekly produce specials and sales; (iii) motivational messages encouraging use of the HMM; and (iv) links to produce coupons that they can exchange at HMM- $5 coupons received weekly for the four-week texting period.	Other: Mobile
No Intervention: Control; The control group will receive the same dosage of daily text messages covering free activities taking place at the Hartford Public Library and other community locations. The control group will not receive incentive coupons.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Change in consumption of fruits	Measured with one question about daily consumption of fruits from a seven item fruit and vegetable checklist developed by Townsend et.al.	Baseline and 6 weeks follow up
Change in consumption of vegetables.	Measured with a one question from a seven item fruit and vegetable checklist developed by Townsend et.al.	Baseline and 6 weeks follow up
Change in fruits eating behaviors Increase consumption of fruits and vegetables	Measured with a readiness 5 item continuous scale item for fruits from fruit and vegetable inventory validated by Townsend et.al.	Baseline and 6 weeks follow up
Change in vegetables eating behaviors. Increase consumption of fruits and vegetables	Measured with a 5 item continuous scale from vegetables from fruit and vegetable inventory validated by Townsend et.al.	Baseline and 6 weeks follow up
Change in amount of money spent on fruits and vegetables.	self-reported amount of money spent on fresh produce per month.	Baseline and at 6 week follow up
Change in amount of money spent on fruits.	self-reported amount of money spent on fruit per week.	Baseline and at 6 week follow up
Change in amount of money spent on vegetables.	self-reported amount of money spent on vegetables per week.	Baseline and at 6 week follow up
Change in self reported usage of the Hartford Mobile Market for buying fresh produce	self-reported participant's usage of mobile market (yes/no)	baseline and at 6 weeks follow up

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Participant utilization of coupons	Based on one yes/no question about coupon redemption	6 week follow up
Participant's satisfaction with e-texting messages (likeness)	Self reported satisfaction with nutrition messages using a 5- likert scale (like it very much to dislike it very much)	6 weeks follow up
Participant's assessment of usefulness of the messages	Self reported continuous 4 likert scale from not useful to very much useful.	6 weeks follow up
Participant's assessment of usefulness of the coupons	Self reported continuous 4 likert scale from not useful to very much useful.	6 week follow up

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: Sofia Segura-Pérez
• Collaborators: Yale University; Cornell University

Publications and helpful links

Helpful Links

• The NEAT Trial

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Actual): October 23, 2015
• Primary Completion (Actual): September 30, 2016
• Study Completion (Actual): September 30, 2016

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: August 2, 2019
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: August 21, 2019
• First Posted (Actual): August 22, 2019

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): August 22, 2019
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: August 21, 2019
• Last Verified: August 1, 2019

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Keywords: Food Security; Fruits and Vegetables; Food Access; Low-Income
• Other Study ID Numbers: HHCNEAT2015

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