The NIMHD Strategic Plan proposes a critical focus on studying underlying factors contributing to health disparities, such as obesity, among racial/ethnic minorities. The proposed Ruth L. Kirschstein NRSA is a two-year program of research and training focused on uncovering the underlying associations among environmental, cognitive, and behavioral factors that contribute to obesity health disparities among African American (AA) adolescent girls. Rates of overweight/obesity and related comorbidities among AA adolescent girls are much higher than rates in other racial/ethnic groups, highlighting a critical health disparity. AAs who are obese are more likely to remain obese through adulthood and develop health consequences, such as type 2 diabetes and hypertension. Therefore, preventing overweight/obesity in this group is critical. Yet, prevention and intervention efforts must account for the multiple systems that influence obesity risk, specifically individual and environmental factors. AA individuals may be more vulnerable to environmental factors, such as food marketing, compared to other groups. Obese AA adolescents may be more prone to over-attention toward food-related stimuli (i.e., attentional biases [ABs]) increasing the potential rol of food marketing. Together, these factors may lead to unhealthy eating behaviors and increase obesity risk. Among 120 AA obese (n=60) and non-overweight (n=60) adolescent girls, the proposed project will examine the effect of food marketing and ABs on eating behaviors. Food cue ABs will be examined using an attention bias visual dot probe task. Afterwards, AA girls will view a video clip embedded with either a food commercial or a neutral/non-food commercial. Eating behavior will be assessed using a laboratory test meal. This study will evaluate the hypotheses that food marketing and ABs individually impact food consumption among AA adolescent girls. Further, we expect that girls who view the food commercial and have high ABs will consume more overall food. Findings from the proposed study will elucidate the associations among environmental, cognitive, and behavioral factors that may contribute to obesity risk in AA adolescent girls. If successful, this project may assist in identifying individual and environmenta targets for obesity prevention, such as attentional retraining and limits on youth-targeted food marketing, respectively. Data have the potential to build scientific support towards important regulatory policies to encourage alignment of marketing with nutritional guidelines and limits on food marketing towards youth and racial/ethnic minorities. The proposed NRSA will provide conceptual, technical, and professional skills training in understanding socio-ecological factors within health disparities research, psychological theories that drive marketing techniques, ABs, and ways to disseminate research to inform policy. The innovative integration of food marketing, an ABs paradigm, and a laboratory test meal will elucidate how the current food environment, food-related cognitions, and eating behaviors interact to contribute to the development and maintenance of obesity risk in AA girls, a vulnerable group.
African American adolescent girls have the highest obesity rates of all other racial/ethnic youth. More food advertisements that promote unhealthy foods are shown to African Americans compared to other groups, which may lead to unhealthy eating and obesity, especially among African American girls who pay more attention to food images than any other images in their environment. Results from this study may help determine individual and environmental changes that must be made in order to reduce these effects in African American girls.
