ERS's competitive grants and cooperative agreements program made
10 awards* in fiscal 2011 to fund research on
relationships between food assistance programs, food choices, and
the economy; and using behavioral economics and incentives to
promote child nutrition.
Food Assistance Programs, Food Choices, and the
Economy
Effect of New WIC Food
Packages on Breastfeeding and Food Package Choices
Dr. Theodore Joyce
National Bureau of Economic Research, New York, NY
This study will analyze changes in breastfeeding initiation,
exclusivity, duration, and choice of food package associated with
recent revisions in the food packages issued to participants in the
Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and
Children (WIC). Revisions to the WIC food packages,
implemented in 2009, restrict issuance of formula to infants of
partially breastfeeding women in the first month, with the goal of
encouraging women to exclusively breastfeed. The study will use the
Pediatric Nutrition Surveillance System (PedNSS) in 17 States and
program administrative data in 5 States.
Grant: $198,000
An Examination of WIC
Participant Redemption Patterns In Kentucky Prior to and After
Implementation of Electronic Benefits Transfer
Mr. Loren Bell
Altarum Institute, Ann Arbor, MI
The Special Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program for Women,
Infants and Children (WIC) is moving from State agency-issued
vouchers to pay for authorized foods to State-run electronic
benefit transfer (EBT) systems. This study will examine how the
changeover affects participants' selection of authorized foods and
where participants shop, utilizing redemption data from Kentucky
collected before the transition (2011) and after (2012). The study
will also examine post-transition data from Nevada and
Michigan.
Grant: $176,000
Using the National Food
and Nutrition Survey (NATFAN) to Examine WIC Participant Food
Choices and Intakes Before and After Changes in the Food
Benefit
Dr. Carol Spaulding
Texas A&M University, College Station, TX
This project will assess the impact of the new WIC food packages
on food choices and intakes of selected items for women, infants,
and children, using data from the National Food and Nutrition
Survey of WIC Participants (NATFAN). Over 50 State and territorial
WIC programs participated in the NATFAN survey, which collected
information regarding WIC client attitudes, knowledge, purchasing,
and consumption practices before and after the food package
changes. The project will also assemble a publicly available
dataset of the NATFAN survey.
Grant: $200,000
The Economics of
Beverage Choices among WIC and SNAP participants
Dr. Tatiana Andreyeva
Yale University, New Haven, CT
This study will examine the purchase of sugar-sweetened
beverages (SSBs) among participants in USDA's Special Supplemental
Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) and
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in two
Northeastern States. It has three aims: (1) to describe the
purchase behavior of WIC recipients; (2) to examine how sensitive
SNAP participants' SSB purchases are to changes in SSB taxation,
and (3) to evaluate whether changes to the WIC food package induced
changes in purchase behavior over time, since the changes to WIC
packages took place during the period under study.
Assistance Type Cooperative Agreement: $129,000
The Supplemental Nutrition
Assistance Program and Household Spending: A Flexible Demand System
Approach
Dr. Tullaya Boonsaeng
Clemson University, Clemson, SC
This project examines the impact of the Supplemental Nutrition
Assistance Program (SNAP, formerly called the Food Stamp Program),
household socioeconomic and geographic characteristics, and
selected prices on household spending for food and nonfood items. A
flexible two-stage household budgeting framework and data from the
U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS)
Consumer Expenditure Survey and other extant sources are used to
estimate household response parameters.
Cooperative Research Agreement: $105,000
Local Area Determinants
of Nutrition Assistance Program Caseloads
Dr. Caroline Danielson
Public Policy Institute of California, San Francisco, CA
This project uses county-level data on food assistance program
caseloads and measures of the economy to improve our understanding
of how participation in the three largest U.S. nutrition assistance
programs-the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), the
National School Lunch Program (NSLP), and the Supplemental
Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC)-varies
with the state of the local economy.
Assistance Type Cooperative Agreement: $221,000
The Effect
of Food Programs on Alternative Poverty Measures
Dr. Linda Giannarelli
The Urban Institute, Washington, DC
This project assesses the extent to which nutrition programs
reduced poverty before, during, and after the 2007-2009 recession.
Poverty is measured using the U.S. Census Bureau's current version
of the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM). Unlike the official
poverty measure, which considers only cash income, the SPM includes
all key family resources, including near-cash income from the
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), Special
Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children
(WIC) and the National School Lunch Program (NSLP).
Grant: $171,000
Using Behavioral Economics and Incentives to Promote Child
Nutrition
Cornell Center for
Behavioral Economics in Child Nutrition Programs (additional
funding)
Dr. David Just
Cornell University, Ithaca, NY
The Center will facilitate new and innovative research on the
application of behavioral economic theory to child nutrition
program operations and activities, leading to program improvements
that will benefit children's diets and health; broaden social
scientist participation in such research; and disseminate research
findings to key stakeholder groups, including other researchers,
policy and program officials, and the general public.
Grant: $571,000
Using Nudges and
Incentives to Promote Long-Run Consumption of Fruits and Vegetables
in Children
Dr. Joseph Price
Brigham Young University, Provo, UT
This project examines whether a set of behavioral
economics-based interventions implemented in 30 elementary schools
in Utah that result in short-term increases in children's healthy
food choices also change long-run habits and if so, how long it
takes to produce lasting changes. In addition, the project examines
the simultaneous effects of multiple small behavioral
economics-based changes, to see if simultaneous use results in
synergistic effects, crowd-out effects, or even boomerang
effects.
Grant: $244,000
Long-term Effects
of Incentivizing Fruit and Vegetable Consumption
Dr. Gregory Madden
Utah State University, Logan, UT
This study will build on the results of earlier research, to
examine the long-term effects of the Food Dudes Healthy Eating
Program, which encourages consumption of fruit and vegetables among
elementary schoolchildren. Results released in late September 2011
showed that fruit and vegetable consumption increased by more than
40 percent among schoolchildren when the Food Dudes incentives were
in place. This followup study will examine the effect on students'
food choices after the Food Dudes Program has been in place for a
year in six Utah elementary schools.
Grant: $155,000
*Award amounts are rounded to the
nearest thousand.
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