Table 1 Summary of measures used

SPAN Healthy Eating Index (SHEI)

Combines information on previous day consumption of both healthy marker foods, and unhealthy marker foods, as reported by child

Eight healthy foods included in the index include baked or grilled (not fried) meats, milk, yogurt, brown rice, brown pasta, a variety of vegetable types, fruits (not fruit juice), and beans. The five unhealthy foods include fried meat, red meat, sugar-sweetened beverages, salty fried snacks, and a variety of dessert items. Items are summed, and scaled to a range of 0-100, with higher values representing healthier diets.

0-100

Socioeconomic Status

Categorical measure of parental education

Single measure classified into 4 categories

0-3

Neighborhood Environment (specific)

Perceived Neighborhood Food Access (reported by parents)

Single binary measure

0-1

Neighborhood Environment (global)

Neighborhood/School SES measure: Percent of children not eligible for free / subsidized school lunches

Single continuous measure, obtained from publicly available administrative data

0-100

Physical Home food environment index

Consists of 2 sub-indices – availability of healthy foods and absence of unhealthy foods

Availability of healthy food derived as sum of 4 binary indicators describing availability of each of 4 healthy marker foods)

Absence of unhealthy food derived as sum of 2 binary indicators describing frequency of serving each of 2 unhealthy marker foods)

0-4

0-2

Social Home food environment index

Includes measures of frequency of family meals, watching TV during meals, and eating at a restaurant in the past week as reported by the child

Three binary measures are summed into a single index describing the social home food environment

0-3

Socio-demographic measures

Age of child

Number of children in household

Ethnicity

Location: Urban, rural or suburban

Four different measures used and entered into models as distinct measures.