Assessment of the dining environment on and near the campuses of fifteen post-secondary institutions

Abstract

Objective: The present study evaluated the restaurant and dining venues on and near post-secondary campuses varying in institution size. Design: The Nutrition Environment Measures Survey for Restaurants (NEMS-R) was modified to evaluate restaurants as fast food, sit down and fast casual; and campus dining venues as dining halls, student unions and snack bar/cafés. ANOVA with post hoc Tukey's B and T tests were used to distinguish differences between dining venues and associated institutions by size. Setting: The study was conducted at fifteen US post-secondary institutions, 2009-2011. Subjects: Data presented are from a sample of 175 restaurants and sixty-eight on-campus dining venues. Results: There were minimal differences in dining halls by institution size, although medium-sized institutions as compared with small-sized institutions offered significantly more healthful side dish/salad bar items. Dining halls scored significantly higher than student unions or snack bar/cafés on healthful entrées, side dish/salad bar and beverages offerings, but they also had the most barriers to healthful dietary habits (i.e. all-you-can-eat). No differences were found by restaurant type for NEMS-R scores for total restaurant dining environment or healthful entrées and barriers. Snack bars had more healthful side dishes (P 5 0?002) and fast-food restaurants had the highest level of facilitators (i.e. nutrition information; P 5 0?002). Conclusions: Based on this evaluation in fifteen institutions, the full campus dining environment provides limited support for healthy eating and obesity prevention. The quality of campus dining environments can be improved via healthful offerings, providing nutrition information and other supports to facilitate healthy eating and prevent unwanted weight gain.

The food environment of students on a financial assistance programme at the University of the Free State, Bloemfontein

“…2 These changes often result in a positive energy balance, which most often results in weight gain. 2 Food insecurity, on the other hand, has been linked with over-nutrition due to the low cost of energy dense foods. 1,5 Therefore, the NSH beneficiaries (who are food insecure) may be at risk of becoming overweight.…”

“…The effect of the campus food environment on students' eating habits can either be positive or negative. 2 South Africa, as a country, is food secure. However, at household and individual level, half of the population is food insecure.…”

A Community Based Participatory Approach to Training Young Adults to Design and Implement a Social Marketing Framed Lifestyle Intervention on their College Campus (Preprint)

“…Evaluating the surrounding campus environment is another key to success when implementing a healthy lifestyle intervention [14][15][16][17]. Therefore, in the present study students from respective universities also conducted environmental audits of their own campus.…”

“…Students were able to identify areas with potential for bringing student engaged changes and further making healthful adjustments in their campus environment using the HCEA tools [14][15][16][17][19][20][21].…”

Food environments: measuring, mapping, monitoring and modifying

“…the media and advertising) levels (5) ; all four of these are considered in this issue. Across these domains, the papers can be broadly considered as assessing measurement issues (6,7) ; mapping and describing food environments (8)(9)(10) ; and linking environmental exposures with diet (11)(12)(13) .…”