VCU news

By Brian McNeill

Natalia, an 11-year-old from Chesterfield County, had always been a picky eater. So her mother, Sabel Dujka, was immediately interested when she heard that Virginia Commonwealth University researchers were offering easy strategies to help Richmond-area parents concerned about their children's eating and weight.

"I wanted my daughter to be exposed to different ideas and different foods," Dujka said. "I heard about this program through a friend who has a child in a different school, so I signed up."

As part of the program, called NOURISH+ — or Nourishing Our Understanding of Role Modeling to Improve Support and Health — Dujka learned strategies addressing a range of healthy eating and exercise topics, including how to read food labels, tips to teach her daughter about nutrition and exercise, developing mindful eating habits for the whole family, easy ways to prepare healthy family meals, and how to let her daughter help when cooking.

Now, she said, Natalia is far more willing to try — and enjoy — healthier foods.

"She happens to like broccoli and snap peas," she said. "She understands that those items are important to being healthy and for her diet."

NOURISH+ is a VCU research study that seeks to promote healthy eating and exercise in children ages 5 to 11.

"NOURISH focuses on how parents can be role models of healthy choices," said Suzanne Mazzeo, Ph.D., the project's principal investigator and a professor in the Department of Psychology of VCU's College of Humanities and Sciences. "The whole idea is to give parents simple, practical tools they can use to make their families healthier. We want to make it easier for parents."

So far, roughly 200 families from the greater Richmond area have taken part in the study. The researchers are hoping to enroll 250 more parents concerned about their child's eating and exercise habits.

The five-year study, titled "NOURISHing Families to Promote Healthy Eating and Exercise in Overweight Children," is funded by a $2.6 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to test the efficacy of NOURISH+.

Under the study, participating parents are randomly assigned to either a more intensive or less intensive group. Both groups, however, offer an array of practical tips and strategies, the researcher said. "In both interventions, we tried to have equal numbers of hands-on, practical things so they learn about nutrition, physical activity and more," Mazzeo said.

One of the program's guiding philosophies is that it takes more than just education to improve eating habits.

"Parents usually know what they should do. The hard part is doing it — especially doing it over and over and over, multiple times a day," Mazzeo said. "Eating is the hardest thing to change because it's something you do multiple times a day. When you're a parent, you can feel like you just made a meal, you finish cleaning up and now you're making another one. It's a never-ending cycle.”

Many parents have a tough time trying to encourage healthy eating habits among their children, Mazzeo said, as they often work long hours; their kids are also very busy and families struggle to find the time, money and energy needed to prepare healthy meals.

Moreover, she said, we live in a "toxic environment" in which advertising often encourages unhealthy eating.

"There's not just the pressure of getting it on the table — and there are financial and practical and time barriers that make that challenging — there's also the influence that all these marketers and their peers have on them," Mazzeo said. "You're constantly fighting what advertising is telling your kids and what their friends are eating and all those other pressures."

Mazzeo added that NOURISH+ aims to provide help without making parents feel guilty.

"A lot of what's out there about pediatric obesity can lead parents to feel blamed — 'This is your fault.' A lot of our parents have expressed that when they take their kid to the pediatrician, and the pediatrician says their kid is overweight, they feel blamed," Mazzeo said. "But, in reality, it's really difficult in this culture to raise healthy eaters.”

Rachel Gow, Ph.D., an assistant professor of psychology and pediatrics at VCU and a collaborator on the study, said many of the best ideas and tips for parents have come from other parents during group discussions.

"For example, there was a recent group that I co-led [and] most of the moms in the group were single mothers, who all had at least one job if not two jobs," she said. "A lot of them were getting takeout a lot, or eating frozen, unhealthy foods. But this one mom talked about her lists — she did a really good job of meal planning and budgeting and sticking to her plan. Her talking about her strategies and making her budget stretch made such a difference."

By hearing from their fellow parents, Gow said, the program shows that encouraging healthy eating may not be easy, but it is possible.

"You can do it," Mazzeo said. "You just have to be creative and empowered."

For Dujka, NOURISH+ was a great success, and one that she would recommend to other parents.

"I would recommend it because of the exposure [to helpful ideas], how to talk to children as parents in a positive way and getting them involved," she said.

For more information
To find out more or to learn if you are eligible, visit www.nourishvcu.com, or contact the NOURISH+ team at 827-9211 or nourish@vcu.edu.

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Researchers' Tips for Promoting Healthy Eating Behaviors

NOURISH+ researchers Suzanne Mazzeo, Ph.D., and Rachel Gow, Ph.D., both of whom are VCU experts in healthy eating behaviors for children and families, offered a few tips that parents can employ to improve their families' eating habits.

• Never go to the grocery store without a plan, and stick to the plan while shopping.
  
  
• While grocery shopping, buy food located on the periphery of the store, such as the fresh produce section, rather than in the middle of the store, where processed, unhealthy foods are found.
  
  
• Buy a crock pot, which makes preparing meals easier, particularly ahead of time.
  
  
• Buy a blender. "Smoothies are such a great way to introduce and sneak in fruits," Gow said.
  
  
• Do something active with your kids, such as taking a walk along trails at a Richmond park, or taking them roller skating.
  
  
• Give your kids nonfood rewards, rather than sweets. "You have to brainstorm what would be best for your kids, but it can be something like an opportunity to do a special activity with mom or dad," Mazzeo said.

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