The school environment and sugar-sweetened beverage consumption among Guatemalan adolescents

Abstract

Guatemalan adolescents frequently consume SSB, which may be encouraged by aspects of the school environment. Schools represent a viable setting for equitable population health interventions designed to reduce SSB consumption, including increasing access to clean drinking-water, reducing access to SSB, restricting SSB marketing and greater enforcement of existing food policies.

Impact of school and work status on diet and physical activity in rural Guatemalan adolescent girls: a qualitative study

“…5,6,15,16 However, most of this work has been conducted in large metropolitan settings (including in Guatemala) and much less is known about the choices of adolescent girls from outside these areas. 18,20 In addition, comparative work on the choices of out-of-school girls has not been conducted, despite the importance of this issue in LMICs, where many adolescents are not enrolled in school due to multiple reasons, including work and pregnancy. Our qualitative interviews with adolescent girls either in or out of school and working from a midsized, predominantly indigenous Maya town address these issues.…”

“…These findings are similar to urban Guatemalan schools and described how, in that setting, energy-dense snacks and sugarsweetened beverages available at kiosks around schools comprise a large proportion of the school food environment. [18][19][20]32 Even though out-of-school and working adolescents seem to have less eating habit disruption, they struggled to find time for physical activity and therefore had a much more sedentary lifestyle than their counterparts enrolled in school. They identified home and work responsibilities, significant life changes (e.g., pregnancy) triggering transition out of school, and access to opportunities afforded by the school environment as limiting factors to exercise.…”

“…In particular, given the demands of school schedules, many students described skipping or rushing meals due to a limited amount of time: In contrast to students, a few less participants not enrolled in school (75%) discussed disruption to their daily eating schedules. One individual 18 Ann For individuals experiencing schedule disruptioneither due to school or work obligations-another very common reinforcing theme was that busyness frequently led to lack of appetite, leading to more meal skipping or irregular snacking:…”

“…For example, junk food vendors in close proximity to schools are important drivers of adolescent diet quality in Brazil 17 and Guatemala. 18,19 In addition, family or community gender norms as well as differential opportunities doi: 10.1111/nyas.14183 for girls to participate in sports both in community and school venues are important determinants of physical activities disparities in Guatemala, 20 Nigeria, 21 India, 22 and Costa Rica. 23 Similarly, differential responsibility for domestic chores has been reported that adversely affect lifestyle habits for girls in several settings.…”

“…Therefore, understanding the impact of out-of-school (e.g., due to work and motherhood) status on adolescent behaviors in an LMIC setting is an important research priority. In Guatemala, around half of adolescents and young adults (aged [15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24] are out of school. Girls are more likely to be out of school (55%) than are boys (49%).…”