Food at Home Study

The foods we eat are important because food helps us express our culture and brings people together. Foods also can help keep our bodies healthy. Food can also put us at risk for diet-related diseases.

To understand how food can impact our health, it is important to understand the relationship between the foods people eat and health outcomes. Our Food at Home research team has developed a way to measure the food that is available in our everyday home environments. We created a checklist of foods and beverages available in the home called the Home Food Inventory, or HFI for short. We know that the foods that are available in our homes are the foods we choose to eat when we are at home. We want to update the HFI so that it is shorter and make sure it is useful for people who speak English at home. We also want the HFI to be useful for people who speak Spanish at home. We updated the HFI by adding cultural foods and translating the HFI into Spanish. We want to making sure the HFI is easy to complete in both English and Spanish. We also developed an electronic version of the HFI. The electronic version of the HFI will provide the written word, a visual image, and a link to hear the word spoken aloud in English or Spanish.

You can be a part of this research study if

• You are at least 18 years old
• You are the person in your household who does most of the grocery shopping and/or cooking
• You speak Spanish or English at home

The research study includes 3 parts that will be completed over a months time. A home visit, food interviews, and mailing the HFI checklist to us. You will receive gift cards for completing each part of the research study.

• During the home visit, two study staff members will come to your house. They will explain the study to you, measure your height and weight, and ask you to complete the HFI checklist about the foods you have in your home. While you are completing the HFI checklist, a study staff member will be completing it too, so we can see if the same foods are checked off.
• The home visit will take about 2 hours.
• You will receive a $50 gift card.

• You will do two interviews that ask about the food and drinks you had the day before.
• The food interviews will take about 30 minutes each and will be done over the phone.
• You can find the Food Amounts Booklet that you will need for the food interview here.
• You will receive $25 for completing each food interview.

• We know the food people have at home changes so we want to do the checklist two times so we get better idea of the food you usually have at home. During the home visit, you will complete the HFI checklist. We will leave you with another checklist for you to complete in two weeks and mail back to us.
• You will receive $25 for mailing in the checklist.

In the end, we hope to better understand how home food environments are related to the health of both households who speak Spanish or English at home. Then we can use this information to design programs and messages to help families have healthier home food environments.