Exposure to stressful life experiences during childhood, such as food insecurity, can have negative consequences for attainment later in life. The developmental timing of stressful events and how they influence outcomes over the life course is a critical area of research. Indeed, a more comprehensive understanding of the latter life consequences of childhood food insecurity could guide policy-makers in designing more effective social policies to reduce the severity of the poor life outcomes. This project uses data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics to estimate the young adult impacts (as late as age 25) of food insecurity experienced in discrete childhood stages – middle childhood (ages 5-10), early adolescence (ages 11-14), and middle adolescence (ages 15-18). It aims to identify which childhood stage-specific effects of food insecurity are most important to five young adult outcomes in two main areas – risky sexual behaviors and criminal justice involvement. Results provide consistent evidence that the mean food security scores in middle childhood are associated with the criminal justice involvement outcome. The results are less consistent with the sexual risk taking outcomes. Middle childhood food insecurity is associated with the number of sexual partners in young adulthood, while early adolescent food insecurity is associated with the number of children in young adulthood. Results indicate that male respondents appear to be more sensitive to food insecurity than females.
PSID
The University of Michigan's Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) is the longest continuously running longitudinal survey in the world. It began in 1968 as a survey of 4,802 American families and has followed the same parents, along with their children and grandchildren as they split off to form their own households, so that today there are more than 11,000 PSID families and 25,000 individuals. The topics in the survey span work, welfare, family structure, income, consumption, health, and wealth, making the PSID ideally suited for the study of household behaviors over time and across generations. The USDA sponsored the 18-item Household Food Security Module on the 1999, 2001, and 2003 survey years, along with the 1997 Child Development Supplement. The USDA Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) subsequently provided funding to include the food security module on the 2014 PSID Child Development Supplement (CDS) survey and starting with 2015 on the biennial core PSID surveys. This offers the first opportunity to answer key pressing scientific and policy issues such as the persistence of food insecurity within and across generations, and how changes in food security affect and are affected by the level and change in consumption, wealth, and broader measures of health.
UKCPR partnered with the USDA's Economic Research Service and the USDA Food and Nutrition Service to launch a competitively awarded grants program in 2017. The first round of projects were completed at the end of 2018.
2019
The influence of nutrition assistance program participation, parental nutritional knowledge, and family foodways on food security and child well-being
In this report we present results from our study of the effect of SNAP and WIC participation during childhood on food insecurity risk in young adulthood. We also examined the effect of parental nutritional knowledge and childhood food involvement on food insecurity in young adulthood. We used data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics Original Childhood Development Supplement. Our balanced panel (n=1,305) was comprised of individuals who were 0-12 years old in 1997, had data on SNAP and income from their year of birth through 2015, food insecurity data in 2015/2017, and had moved out of their parents’ home and started their own household prior to 2015. We estimated logistic models using sample, cluster and strata weights to generate nationally representative results. We find a small, but non-statistically significant effect of SNAP and WIC participation during childhood on odds of being food insecure during young adulthood. When examining change in food security from 1999-2015, we find that participation in SNAP during ages 0-5 years (OR 2.36, 95% CI: 0.99, 5.61), and during ages 12-18 years (OR 2.68, 95% CI: 1.09, 6.57) is associated with a higher odds of being more secure in 2015 than in 1999 compared to low income children who were eligible for, but did not participate in SNAP. Participation in both SNAP and WIC during ages 0-5 predicts higher odds (OR: 4.47, 95% CI: 2.04, 9.78) of being more secure in young adulthood than in childhood compared to low income children who were eligible for, but did not participate in SNAP or WIC. Finally, we saw a statistically significant protective effect of high parental nutritional knowledge (in 1999) and child time spent preparing food (during ages 5-12) on food insecurity risk in 2015-2017. SNAP and WIC, as well as parental nutritional knowledge and childhood food involvement appear to have some protective effect on food insecurity in young adulthood. Future research should further investigate the effects of nutrition education, nutrition assistance program participation, and involvement in food preparation on food insecurity over the short- and long-term.
The long-term health consequences of childhood food insecurity
This study examined the long-term consequences of frequency, timing, and severity of food insecurity exposure in childhood on health and health care utilization in adulthood using nearly 20 years of data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. The findings provide evidence of the long-lasting health effects of childhood food insecurity. Young adults who experienced food insecurity as children have higher psychological distress, even when adjusting for childhood socioeconomic status, parent’s health, health during childhood, and food insecurity during adulthood. More severe and more frequent episodes of childhood food insecurity are related to worse psychological distress during adulthood, but even marginal food security and single episodes of food insecurity appear to be related to worse psychological distress during adulthood. Very low food security during childhood also appears to be related to worse physical health during adulthood. Using instrumental variables to adjust for selection into the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), this study also finds some evidence that receipt of SNAP during childhood appears to reduce the effects of childhood food insecurity on health during adulthood.