The connection between the food environment and healthy eating

Environmental factors also affect people’s diet, including their access to healthy or unhealthy food options.This study sought to examine how the following factors influenced people’s weight, their consumption of fruits and vegetables, and fast food and soda consumption. Overall, the scientists found that higher education levels, increased access to grocery stores, and reduced access to fast food had associations with: Next, the scientists assessed the impact of each of these factors among white, Black, and Hispanic populations, individually. The authors outline their findings regarding grocery store access:“[H]igh grocery store access has a significantly larger association with higher fruit and vegetable consumption in zip codes with predominantly Hispanic populations (7.4% difference) and Black populations (10.2% difference) in contrast to zip codes with predominantly white populations (1.7% difference).”Educational levels affected healthy food choices across all groups.