NCT03952754

Effect of Hip Hop Nutrition-Math Curriculum

Effect of an Integrated Nutrition-math Curriculum to Improve Food-purchasing Behavior of Children

• Status: Suspended
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 560 (estimated)
• Sponsor: Columbia University · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 9 Years – 12 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Accepted

Summary

This study is testing the efficacy of the integrative approach to: 1. teach 5th grade children menu board calorie literacy as measured by our novel recently validated menu board calorie literacy (MBCL) instrument; 2. provide strategies designed to improve food purchasing behaviors; and 3. facilitate the transmission of core lesson messages from children to parents via a procedure that we have termed "Child Mediated Health Communication (CMHC)".

Detailed description

Data show that nearly 25% of children aged four to eight years consumed fast food on a typical day. These trends in fast food consumption are more acute among low-income urban dwellers where higher rates of overweight and childhood obesity are seen. This has led to a focus on providing fast food consumers with point-of-purchase nutrition information, such as the calorie posting mandates, in the hopes that these decision cues will help consumers make better informed dietary decisions. Most children chose their own meals at the point-of-purchase. It is clear that additional strategies are needed to encourage the point-of-purchase use of calorie postings, however available studies provide little insight into best practices or the types of approaches needed. It is with this in mind that the investigator developed a school-based approach to improve point-of purchase use of calorie postings, by creating a novel intervention that targets menu board calorie literacy as a means of improving food-purchasing behaviors. Hip Hop Nutrition-Math Curriculum is a novel behaviorally focused multimedia, musical school health rap toolkit that targets what we refer to as menu board calorie literacy. 4th grade common core math standards are integrated into the program in a manner that incorporates evidence-based nutrition education recommendations by the Institute of Medicine and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The investigator proposes to test the efficacy of the integrative approach on food purchasing behaviors of children in an adequately powered, controlled trial. The investigator will test the intervention in the after-school setting among economically disadvantaged children and incorporate parental engagement in our outcome evaluations. There is a partnership with New York City's largest after-school program vendor, New York Edge (formerly called Sports and Arts in Schools foundation/SASF), for the implementation of this study. The goal of a health literacy intervention is to improve health decision-making and/or behavior. For this reason, the investigator will measure both menu board calorie literacy and food choice behavior at a point-of-purchase.

Conditions

• Health Behavior

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
BEHAVIORAL	Hip Hop Nutrition-Math Curriculum	This program teaches children skills needed to understand restaurant-menu boards, how to make healthy food choices, while reinforcing the common core math concepts they are learning in school. The program consists of: 2 lessons a week, of about 1 hour each lesson, for a total of 20 lessons.
BEHAVIORAL	Food Explorers Program	After-school program Food Explorers will represent "Usual Care". This program comprises food and exploration activities, familiarizing children with diverse foods, nutrition concepts, tasty recipes and physical activity.

Timeline

• Start date: 2019-01-07
• Primary completion: 2027-03-01
• Completion: 2027-06-01
• First posted: 2019-05-16
• Last updated: 2025-06-13

Locations

1 site across 1 country: United States