Jan 15, 2019

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation has awarded a grant entitled “Reducing Racial-Ethnic Disparities in Sugar-Sweetened Beverage Intake: The Impact of Nutrition Claims on Fruit Drink Purchases among Parents of Young Children” to CPC Fellow Lindsey Smith Taillie, PhD, and colleague Marissa G. Hall, PhD. This funding will allow for the conduct of research to inform policies to reduce sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) intake among children ages 1-5 years, with a long-term goal of reducing racial-ethnic disparities in childhood obesity.

Over the course of its six months of funding, the $300,000 grant will support the researchers to code photographic data on fruit drinks for the presence and type of nutrition claim, link these claims with data on household beverage purchases at the product-level, and test whether these claims impact parents’ decisions to purchase fruit drinks for their child. Finally, researchers will work with a national nutrition advocacy group to disseminate results to federal policymakers and to the public.

Taillie is a Carolina Population Center Faculty Fellow, and a Research Assistant Professor of UNC’s Department of Nutrition.