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Frontiers in Public Health 2022Malnutrition affects many adolescents in Ethiopia. Over one-third of adolescent girls and two-thirds of boys are thin. Overweight and obesity in Ethiopia is mostly a...
BACKGROUND
Malnutrition affects many adolescents in Ethiopia. Over one-third of adolescent girls and two-thirds of boys are thin. Overweight and obesity in Ethiopia is mostly a concern in urban populations of higher wealth quintiles. Urbanization and globalization of diets is shifting food environments. The objective of this study was to assess whether food environments in and around schools in urban Ethiopia influence dietary diversity, quality, BMI status or perceptions of adolescents.
METHODS
Twelve high schools were selected in Addis Ababa (private/government). From each school, 20 pupils aged 15-19 years were randomly selected ( = 217) and interviewed about assets in their households, their diets (categorized into 10 food groups of the Minimum Dietary Diversity, the Global Dietary Recommendations scores and four categories of the NOVA classification based on level of processing) and their use of pocket money. In addition, food environment audits were conducted within the school compound and a 0.5 km radius around each school and types of food outlets.
RESULTS
On average there were 436 food outlets and 246 food or drink advertisements around each school. The majority of the advertisements (89.9%) were of ultra-processed foods, mostly sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs). Most were positioned on food outlets (89.1%). SSBs or sweets were visibly on display in 26.3% of the outlets and fresh fruits and vegetables in 17.9% of outlets. Dietary diversity of adolescents was poor with an average of 3.6 food groups out of 10 consumed in the last 24 h. Ultra-processed foods and beverages were consumed by 23.5% of adolescents. The majority of adolescents spent their pocket money on SSBs, sweets or fried foods. Our analysis found that higher assets in adolescents' households were associated with higher dietary diversity and consumption of healthy food groups. We found no association between the food environment and dietary indicators or the BMI-z-score.
CONCLUSION
While the school food environments investigated were not conducive with promoting healthy dietary behaviors, we cannot conclude that these environmental factors directly influence adolescents' diets. The pervasive advertising and availability of unhealthy foods and beverages requires policy action for healthy school food environments.
Topics: Adolescent; Beverages; Diet; Ethiopia; Female; Home Environment; Humans; Male; Schools
PubMed: 35462798
DOI: 10.3389/fpubh.2022.861463 -
Journal of Child Health Care : For... Dec 2021Housing is considered a core social determinant of health (SDH) through mechanisms such as the quality, affordability, and location of the home. However, few nationally...
Housing is considered a core social determinant of health (SDH) through mechanisms such as the quality, affordability, and location of the home. However, few nationally representative studies examine these mechanisms simultaneously with child health and healthcare use. To determine the associations between home quality and child health, a series of logistic regression analyses was employed using the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP). The 2014 SIPP sample is a multistage, stratified sample of 53,070 housing units from 820 sample areas designed to represent the civilian, noninstitutionalized population of the United States. The analytic sample included 12,964 children aged 2-14 years. Poor housing quality was defined as whether the home had holes in the floor, cracks in the ceiling, plumbing issues, and/or pest problems. Outcome measures included child health status, number of medical visits, and hospitalizations. The results indicated that poor housing quality was associated with poorer health (OR = 1.16, 95% CI = 1.05-1.27) and a greater number of medical visits (OR = 1.11, 95% CI = 1.03, 1.20) after controlling for number of persons per household, neighborhood safety, nonmetropolitan status, parent's ability to afford housing-related expenses, and other SDH. Future work investigating and intervening on the SDH in children could specifically include the quality and contexts in which homes are situated.
Topics: Child; Child Health; Housing; Housing Quality; Humans; Income; Neighborhood Characteristics; United States
PubMed: 33502907
DOI: 10.1177/1367493520975956 -
Frontiers in Psychology 2022Endogenous visual attention orienting is early available from infancy. It shows a steady development during the preschool period towards monitoring and managing...
Endogenous visual attention orienting is early available from infancy. It shows a steady development during the preschool period towards monitoring and managing executive attention to optimize the interplay between environmental contingencies and internal goals. The current study aims at understanding this transition from basic forms of endogenous control of visual orienting towards the engagement of executive attention, as well as their association with individual differences in temperament and home environment. A total of 150 children between 2 and 4 years of age were evaluated in a Visual Sequence Learning task, measuring visual anticipations in easy (context-free) and complex (context-dependent) stimuli transitions. Results showed age to be a predictor of a reduction in exogenous attention, as well as increased abilities to attempt to anticipate and to correctly anticipate in complex transitions. Home chaos predicted more complex correct anticipations, suggesting that the exposure to more unpredictable environments could benefit learning in context-dependent settings. Finally, temperamental surgency was found to be positively related to sustained attention in the task. Results are informative of age differences in visual attention control during toddlerhood and early childhood, and their association with temperament and home environment.
PubMed: 36619065
DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.1069478 -
Journal of Nutrition Education and... Jun 2022Conducting exploratory factor analysis (EFA) with the existing home environment assessment-the Comprehensive Home Environment Survey (CHES), to identify scales related...
OBJECTIVE
Conducting exploratory factor analysis (EFA) with the existing home environment assessment-the Comprehensive Home Environment Survey (CHES), to identify scales related to food parenting practices.
METHODS
Parents of 3- to 5-year-old children (n = 172) completed the CHES surveys. After selected items from CHES were categorized into food parenting practice constructs, EFA was used to identify potential subconstructs. Internal consistency and Spearman correlation analysis were also conducted.
RESULTS
The EFAs identified 4 factors within the structure, 4 within coercive control, and 2 within autonomy support.
CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS
The results provided preliminary evidence and support that the CHES can be used to measure food parenting practices. The study was limited to a small sample of non-Hispanic White and highly educated participants, less identified items within autonomy support, and lower internal consistency for several identified factors. Confirmatory factor analysis in a larger and more diverse sample is needed for future research.
Topics: Child; Child Rearing; Child, Preschool; Feeding Behavior; Home Environment; Humans; Parent-Child Relations; Parenting; Parents; Surveys and Questionnaires
PubMed: 35491379
DOI: 10.1016/j.jneb.2022.02.010 -
Sensors (Basel, Switzerland) Mar 2022The non-contact patient monitoring paradigm moves patient care into their homes and enables long-term patient studies. The challenge, however, is to make the system...
The non-contact patient monitoring paradigm moves patient care into their homes and enables long-term patient studies. The challenge, however, is to make the system non-intrusive, privacy-preserving, and low-cost. To this end, we describe an open-source edge computing and ambient data capture system, developed using low-cost and readily available hardware. We describe five applications of our ambient data capture system. Namely: (1) Estimating occupancy and human activity phenotyping; (2) Medical equipment alarm classification; (3) Geolocation of humans in a built environment; (4) Ambient light logging; and (5) Ambient temperature and humidity logging. We obtained an accuracy of 94% for estimating occupancy from video. We stress-tested the alarm note classification in the absence and presence of speech and obtained micro averaged F1 scores of 0.98 and 0.93, respectively. The geolocation tracking provided a room-level accuracy of 98.7%. The root mean square error in the temperature sensor validation task was 0.3°C and for the humidity sensor, it was 1% Relative Humidity. The low-cost edge computing system presented here demonstrated the ability to capture and analyze a wide range of activities in a privacy-preserving manner in clinical and home environments and is able to provide key insights into the healthcare practices and patient behaviors.
Topics: Computers; Home Environment; Humans; Monitoring, Physiologic; Privacy
PubMed: 35408127
DOI: 10.3390/s22072511 -
Children (Basel, Switzerland) Sep 2022Mothers are not only the axis of an ecological subsystem for their children but are also capable of creating a significant emotional and psychological environment...
Mothers are not only the axis of an ecological subsystem for their children but are also capable of creating a significant emotional and psychological environment through constant and direct interaction. This leads to interactions and emotional connections with the children, supportive behaviors, and a long-term commitment to their upbringing and development. This study examined the relationship between maternal emotional intelligence (EI) and demographics on the availability of motor affordances in the home environment that are conducive to their child's motor development. Mothers ( = 451) and homes of children aged 18-42 months were assessed using the Persian version of Affordances in the Home Environment for Motor Development-Self-Report (AHEMD-SR) and the Bar-On Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire. In addition, mothers' physical activity (PA) experience and demographic data were collected. Analyses indicated significant correlations between mothers' education, level of PA, and income with EI and motor affordances. EI, PA experience, and select mother demographics were important to the availability of motor affordances in the home. One could also speculate, based on previous research, that such provision may affect the future motor development of the child. Future research should include a younger and more diverse population.
PubMed: 36291378
DOI: 10.3390/children9101442 -
International Journal of Environmental... Aug 2020(1) Background: The recommendation for screen use among preschool-aged children is ≤ 1 h per day. We aimed to assess the relationship between parental and child screen...
(1) Background: The recommendation for screen use among preschool-aged children is ≤ 1 h per day. We aimed to assess the relationship between parental and child screen use and home environment characteristics. (2) Methods: Thirty-six 3-to-4-year-old healthy children were recruited. Parents reported their own and their child's weekday and weekend daytime screen use. The child's home environment and parent-child interactions were assessed using the Infant-Toddler Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment (IT-HOME). Analyses were run to identify relationships between parental and child screen use and the six subscales of the IT-HOME: Responsivity, Acceptance, Organization, Learning Materials, Involvement and Variety. (3) Results: Parents' weekend screen use was correlated to parental responsivity and variety of people and events at home. These relationships remained significant after adjusting for maternal education and number of children at home (Responsivity β = 7.30 (95% CI: 1.75, 12.86), = 0.012) and (Variety β = -2.45, (95% CI: -4.58, -0.31), = 0.026). There was a trend level association between low child's weekend screen use and high presence of learning materials. Other aspects of screen time were not associated with home environment characteristics. (4) Conclusions: Higher parental screen use predicted lower variety and greater parental responsivity, the latter of which was an unexpected finding. Administering the IT-HOME alongside a screen use questionnaire may offer the opportunity for a more comprehensive representation of home environments in today's society. Future research can also clarify facets of parental screen use (e.g., co-viewing, timing) that are more vs. less likely to impact children.
Topics: Child; Child Behavior; Child, Preschool; Humans; Infant; Male; Parent-Child Relations; Parenting; Screen Time; Surveys and Questionnaires; Television
PubMed: 32867027
DOI: 10.3390/ijerph17176207 -
Frontiers in Psychiatry 2022Although the evidence for the genetic basis of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is strong, environmental factors, such as the quality of parenting or the... (Review)
Review
Although the evidence for the genetic basis of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is strong, environmental factors, such as the quality of parenting or the home environment, may moderate such genetic liability. The plausible negative effect of a low-quality home environment and negative parenting on child outcomes is well-established; however, the positive effect of a high-quality environment and positive parenting remained largely uninvestigated. Due to the presence of genetic, temperamental, or physiological factors, children who were traditionally considered for ADHD may be more sensitive to aspects of their environment compared to children who are not at such . Therefore, they would be more affected by their environmental experience, either for good or bad. Under supportive environmental conditions, such individuals might actually outperform their non-vulnerable peers, suggesting that these individual factors might be considered susceptibility factors rather than risk factors. Little is known regarding the positive effect of the environment in the ADHD literature, but it has been demonstrated in cognitive functions that are closely associated with ADHD, such as executive functions (EF). We review this literature and examine the extant empirical support for sensitivity to aspects of the home environment and parenting in the case of ADHD and EF. Moreover, we review factors that could help identify the specific aspects of the home environment and parenting that these children might be more susceptible to. Such knowledge could be valuable when designing preventive interventions and identifying those children that are especially sensitive and could benefit from such interventions. Recommendations for future studies are discussed as well.
PubMed: 35935437
DOI: 10.3389/fpsyt.2022.927411 -
Frontiers in Psychology 2020Prior evidence supports that the home environment is related to children's development of school readiness skills. However, it remains unclear how construct- and...
Prior evidence supports that the home environment is related to children's development of school readiness skills. However, it remains unclear how construct- and timing-specific aspects of the home environment are related to children's school readiness skills, unique from overall, stable aspects of home quality. Unpacking associations due to specific constructs and timing of the home environment may provide insights on the theoretical processes that connect the home environment to school readiness. Using data from the NICHD Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development ( = 1,364), the current study examines how timing (36 and 54 months) and constructs (educational and socio-emotional ) of the home environment, relative to overall levels across time, relate to children's language skills, math skills, and externalizing behaviors. The overall, stable aspects of the home environment were significantly associated with children's language skills and externalizing problems. Additionally, there were significant paths from the stimulation construct at 54 months to math skills, language skills, and externalizing problems. These findings provide evidence that although the overall home environment is predictive of school readiness, the stimulation construct of the home environment at 54 months has additional concurrent relations to children's school readiness. Implications for the role of the home environment and children's school readiness are discussed.
PubMed: 32849148
DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.01959 -
BMC Psychiatry Feb 2022Exposure to inadequate home environment may put the healthy development of familial high-risk children at risk. This study aimed to investigate associations between risk...
BACKGROUND
Exposure to inadequate home environment may put the healthy development of familial high-risk children at risk. This study aimed to investigate associations between risk factors and an adequate home environment of children having a parent diagnosed with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder.
METHODS
From a cohort of 522 children, data from 463 7-year-old children was included. Of these 172 children had familial risk for schizophrenia, 109 children had familial risk for bipolar disorder, and 190 were population-based controls. As part of a comprehensive battery, all participants were assessed with the Middle Childhood-Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment Inventory (MC-HOME Inventory) measuring the quality of the home environment.
RESULTS
When analyzing all families together, we found that having a parent diagnosed with schizophrenia would have a negative impact on the home environment (ß = -1.08; 95% CI (-2.16;-0.01); p = 0.05), while familial risk for bipolar disorder did not show significant predictive value. Being a single caregiver and child having experienced severe life events from ages 4 to 7 showed significant negative impact, while child having a mental illness diagnosis did not. Being a female caregiver, good social functioning of the caregiver, high child IQ and not being a single caregiver were found to predict positive values for the home environment. We found similar results when analyzing caregivers with and without a diagnosis separately.
CONCLUSIONS
Knowledge of what predicts good home environment should be used to inform development of early interventions for families at risk.
Topics: Bipolar Disorder; Child; Child, Preschool; Denmark; Female; Genetic Predisposition to Disease; Home Environment; Humans; Risk Factors
PubMed: 35139818
DOI: 10.1186/s12888-022-03733-5