Nutrition Education Research Review

The Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) supports nutrition education through its programs to help participants choose healthy foods and active lifestyles, within the constraints of a limited budget. Achieving and sustaining positive changes in eating and nutrition-related behaviors is, however, a complex challenge.

FNS encourages providers to incorporate available scientific evidence into their plans and activities in order to maximize the impact of nutrition education. To assist nutrition educators in their use of relevant research, FNS conducted a review of studies on: Message framing, Use of interactive technology to tailor messages, and Intervention intensity.

The review was intended to document how these specific features of nutrition messages and interventions influence the likelihood of promoting more healthful food choices. The review began with a computerized literature search of articles published in peer-reviewed journals between 1995 and 2004. Abstracts were reviewed and articles selected based on topic relevance. A systematic effort was also made to identify pertinent unpublished reports.

Finally, additional studies were incorporated by cross-checking references in the initial set of studies examined. Three comprehensive reviews – one associated with each topic – were produced. There is also a research brief which incorporates information from the individual reviews in an expanded executive summary.