Change in the food environment and measured adiposity in adulthood in the Christchurch Health and development birth cohort, Aotearoa, New Zealand: A birth cohort study

Matthew Hobbs; Geraldine F H McLeod; Joreintje D Mackenbach; Lukas Marek; Jesse Wiki; Bingyu Deng; Phoebe Eggleton; Joseph M Boden; Dhakal Bhubaneswor; Malcolm Campbell; L John Horwood

doi:10.1016/j.healthplace.2023.103078

Change in the food environment and measured adiposity in adulthood in the Christchurch Health and development birth cohort, Aotearoa, New Zealand: A birth cohort study

Health Place. 2023 Sep:83:103078. doi: 10.1016/j.healthplace.2023.103078. Epub 2023 Jul 28.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Faculty of Health, University of Canterbury - Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha, Christchurch, Canterbury, New Zealand; Te Taiwhenua o Te Hauora - GeoHealth Laboratory, University of Canterbury - Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha, Christchurch, Canterbury, New Zealand; The Cluster for Community and Urban Resilience (CURe), University of Canterbury - Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha, Christchurch, Canterbury, New Zealand. Electronic address: matt.hobbs@canterbury.ac.nz.
² Christchurch Health and Development Study, University of Otago - Te Whare Wānanga o Ōtākou, Christchurch, Canterbury, New Zealand.
³ Department of Epidemiology and Data Science, Amsterdam UMC Location Vrije University, Amsterdam, the Netherlands; Upstream Team, www.upstreamteam.nl, Amsterdam UMC, Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
⁴ Faculty of Health, University of Canterbury - Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha, Christchurch, Canterbury, New Zealand; Te Taiwhenua o Te Hauora - GeoHealth Laboratory, University of Canterbury - Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha, Christchurch, Canterbury, New Zealand.
⁵ Te Taiwhenua o Te Hauora - GeoHealth Laboratory, University of Canterbury - Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha, Christchurch, Canterbury, New Zealand; School of Population Health, Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences, The University of Auckland - Waipapa Taumata Rau, Auckland, New Zealand.
⁶ Te Taiwhenua o Te Hauora - GeoHealth Laboratory, University of Canterbury - Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha, Christchurch, Canterbury, New Zealand; School of Earth and Environment, University of Canterbury - Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha, Christchurch, Canterbury, New Zealand.

PMID: 37517383
DOI: 10.1016/j.healthplace.2023.103078

Abstract

This study investigated associations between change in the food environment and change in measured body mass index (BMI) and waist circumference (WC) in the Christchurch Health and Development Study (CHDS) birth cohort. Our findings suggest that cohort members who experienced the greatest proportional change towards better access to fast food outlets had the slightly larger increases in BMI and WC. Contrastingly, cohort members who experienced the greatest proportional change towards shorter distance and better access to supermarkets had slightly smaller increases in BMI and WC. Our findings may help explain the changes in BMI and WC at a population level.

Keywords: Cohort study; Fast-food; Food environment; Geographical information systems; Longitudinal; Supermarket.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Adiposity*
Birth Cohort*
Body Mass Index
Cohort Studies
Fast Foods
Humans
New Zealand / epidemiology
Obesity / epidemiology
Waist Circumference