It's all about the children: a participant-driven photo-elicitation study of Mexican-origin mothers' food choices

Details

• Alternative Title:
  BMC Womens Health
• Personal Author:
  Johnson, Cassandra M ; Sharkey, Joseph R ; Dean, Wesley R
• Description:
  Background
  
  There is a desperate need to address diet-related chronic diseases in Mexican-origin women, particularly for those in border region colonias (Mexican settlements) and other new destination communities in rural and non-rural areas of the U.S. Understanding the food choices of mothers, who lead food and health activities in their families, provides one way to improve health outcomes in Mexican-origin women and their children. This study used a visual method, participant-driven photo-elicitation, and grounded theory in a contextual study of food choices from the perspectives of Mexican-origin mothers.
  
  Methods
  
  Teams of trained promotoras (female community health workers from the area) collected all data in Spanish. Ten Mexican-origin mothers living in colonias in Hidalgo County, TX completed a creative photography assignment and an in-depth interview using their photographs as visual prompts and examples. English transcripts were coded inductively by hand, and initial observations emphasized the salience of mothers' food practices in their routine care-giving. This was explored further by coding transcripts in the qualitative data analysis software Atlas.ti.
  
  Results
  
  An inductive conceptual framework was created to provide context for understanding mothers' daily practices and their food practices in particular. Three themes emerged from the data: 1) a mother's primary orientation was toward her children; 2) leveraging resources to provide the best for her children; and 3) a mother's daily food practices kept her children happy, healthy, and well-fed. Results offer insight into the intricate meanings embedded in Mexican-origin mothers' routine food choices.
  
  Conclusions
  
  This paper provides a new perspective for understanding food choice through the eyes of mothers living in the colonias of South Texas -- one that emphasizes the importance of children in their routine food practices and the resilience of the mothers themselves. Additional research is needed to better understand mothers' perspectives and food practices with larger samples of women and among other socioeconomic groups.
  
  
• Subjects:
  Adult Attitude To Health Child Child, Preschool Choice Behavior Cultural Characteristics Female Food Habits Food Preferences Health Promotion Humans Male Maternal Behavior Mexican Americans Mother-Child Relations Mothers Photography Questionnaires Research Article Socioeconomic Factors Young Adult

  More +
• Source:
  BMC Womens Health. 2011; 11:41.
• Pubmed ID:
  21943081
• Pubmed Central ID:
  PMC3200150
• Document Type:
  Journal Article
• Funding:
  1U48DP001924/DP/NCCDPHP CDC HHS/United States ; 5P20MD002295/MD/NIMHD NIH HHS/United States
• Place as Subject:
  Texas
• Volume:
  11
• Collection(s):
  CDC Public Access
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha256:2706bbbcc2763bbd5eca638b294071eb4860c95f01ba3d3b114fd124d4e4eb80
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/22773/cdc_22773_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 1.09 MB ]