When a researcher at Health and Wellbeing Queensland asked 32 students from three greater Brisbane high schools to create a photo diary of the food in their lives, their disposable cameras revealed an important insight into the foodscape of Australian adolescents.
Researcher Dr Kora Uhlmann discovered that where they live played a big part in their choices – and their attitudes around those choices.
For the students from the rural school, photos of food included shows of cows and vegetable gardens. In the interviews Dr Uhlmann conducted to accompany their photos, the language the adolescents used to talk about what they ate each day included words such as “kill” or “paddock” – themes that were notably absent from the city-based students’ food diaries.
The published results showed that, across the three schools, 43 per cent of all photos were of discretionary foods, including pre-packaged snacks and chips. In the conversations she had with them about their food diaries, dr Uhlmann says they understood fruit to be a “healthy” food. Other foods and eating habits were described as being “healthy-ish” – such as using chocolate as a reward for healthy eating.
Another explained pancakes were a “healthy-ish” breakfast, while a 16-year-old said she sometimes made “kind of healthy pizzas”.
Some of the study’s respondents believed a “balanced” diet could be achieved by adding one healthy food item to an unhealthy food item.
“If you like say have hot chips in a day, then you can’t have like dessert later that night,” one student said.
Concept of a balanced diet is misunderstood
Dr Uhlmann’s research revealed that adolescents seemed unaware that one piece of fruit per day did not constitute a healthy diet, or that the consumption of fruit had a net neutral effect on their bodies if they ate discretionary foods afterwards.
Her own interest in the relationship Australian teenagers have with food was inspired by her ongoing fascination with “increasing evidence that shows how our connection to nature improves human health and wellbeing”.
To me, food is essentially a part of nature, so I wanted to explore this relationship further,” Dr Uhlmann told EducationDaily. “When moving from rural NSW to urban Brisbane, I was disheartened to see how little young people knew about the origins of their food, and wondered if this disconnect has further implications for their relationship with food.”
She says her study of adolescent food environments aimed to better understand “what their lived experiences with the food system entails”.
“We were also interested to see how these experiences might differ between settings with varying levels of food growing, so we invited teenagers attending school in a remote area as well as two in more urban settings (with one of these schools offers on-site agricultural programs) within south-east Queensland,” she says.
Urban vs rural attitudes to food
One of the results that surprised her was in relation to the difference between teenagers understanding of the food system between the urban and rural settings.
“Teenagers living more remotely expressed a much deeper and holistic understanding of the food system and were very proud of their local food producers,” Dr Uhlmann told EducationDaily.
The lack of photos and discussion about food marketing also surprised her.
“This suggests that they could be desensitised to the bombardment of marketing strategies or be completely oblivious to the marketing around them,” she told EducationDaily. “Either way, this is highly concerning, as we know that food marketing campaigns are designed to influence food and drink consumption.”
Thirdly, Dr Uhlmann says she was also surprised at the strong emotional connection that food elicits in young people, as well the significant role that family still plays in their relationship with food.
“They were acutely aware of how food influences their health and wellbeing, as well as the important social and cultural connecting role it plays within their lives. However, there was definitely some confusion about what food and habits constitute a healthy or balanced diet. With a pizza being called a ‘healthy-ish’ meal, and a balanced died being explained as the consumption of one fruit balancing out the consumption of a chocolate bar.”
Emotional eating
The study, she says, “really highlights the importance of emotional connections that we form with food”.
“Food is not just about sustenance. Therefore, I am passionate about empowering adolescents to make healthy choices (with information, experiences and role modelling), but also ensuring that our food environments are helping to make the healthy choice the easy choice,” she told EducationDaily. “This supports Health and Wellbeing Queensland’s vision of an intergenerational opportunity to improve the health and wellbeing of all Queenslanders and underpins many of the programs and initiatives.”
The findings reinforce, she says, how vital it is that young people’s experience of the food environment “are sought and taken into consideration in policy or program development (whatever the setting)”.
“And that, although accurate and reliable information on healthy food and drinks are extremely important, this research really highlighted the importance of creating happy memories and experiences with healthy food to strengthen these emotional connections and foster better habits,” she says.
Cultivating healthy food habits
Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden Foundation CEO Dr Cathy Wilkinson believes schools can do more to help bridge the disconnect between how food ends up on our plates.
“When children and young people experience the cycle of growing, harvesting, preparing, and sharing their own sustainable produce through practical, hands-on kitchen and garden classes, they become active participants in local food production systems, gaining knowledge and skills while improving nutrition and access to food,” Dr Wilkinson told EducationDaily.
“Kitchen garden programs provide hands-on, contextual learning opportunities delivered through kitchen and garden settings, improving educational outcomes across the curriculum, while supporting student retention, school enjoyment, and parent engagement.”
Dr Wilkinson told EducationDaily children and young people “do their best to navigate increasingly complex food systems”.
“The young people interviewed stated that they are looking for ‘encouragement and support to enable them to be involved in more healthful behaviours’ and that they value opportunities for connection and bonding over food,” she says.
And with the World Health Organization recognising schools as effective health promotion settings, and evidence that suggests eating habits, lifestyle, and behaviour patterns adopted during childhood endure and can have a significant influence on health and well-being in later life, Dr Wilkinson says the study’s findings “clearly articulate what young people need, and opportunities exist to meet those needs through education”.
“It would be alarming if their calls to action were not met.”
Better food education should be served up at schools
Deanne Wooden is the Queensland Association of School Tuckshops (QAST) CEO and believes it’s “great to understand more about the ‘foodscapes’ of Australian adolescents”.
The research finding that 43 per cent of the food photos are of discretionary foods is not surprising,” Ms Wooden told EducationDaily. “We know from dietary surveys in Australia that up to 48 per cent of energy comes from unhealthy foods, and between 53 and 64 per cent of the family food budget is spent on discretionary items. This is why it is even more important for schools to be places that support healthy eating, rather than continue to undermine healthy choices for students.”
To help educate young people about how to make healthier food choices, Ms Wooden says a “whole of school approach to a healthy food culture is the most effective way”.
“There is absolutely no point teaching good nutrition in the curriculum, only to have students walk out of the classroom into a tuckshop full of nutrient-poor, energy dense options. This sends a very confusing and conflicting message to students,” Ms Wooden says.
Improving food literacy
Food literacy, she says, has been described as ‘a collection of inter-related knowledge, skills and behaviours required to plan, manage, select, prepare and eat food to meet needs’.
“Eating well begins with building food literacy, and one of the most effective ways to do this is to teach cooking skills from a young age,” Ms Wooden told EducationDaily. “Food preparation and cooking can be integrated across many different areas of the curriculum, like learning about food cycles in science, measuring ingredients in maths, writing recipes in English, or cooking spaghetti Bolognese in Home Economics.”
But with more and more families relying on school tuckshops every day, she wants to see canteen associations working closely with schools to offer healthy menus and help ensure students have access to at least one nutritious meal on school days.
One of the most alarming aspects of the study, Ms Wooden says, is that “many students interviewed appeared to think consuming unhealthy foods could be balanced by consuming a healthy food, almost on a one-for-one basis”.
“The obvious problem is this approach continues the trend of a diet consisting of 50 per cent unhealthy foods,” she says. “Additionally, there is a continued perception that unhealthy foods are a treat, when in reality they are being consumed so often they are actually a regular food.”
Tips for healthier teenagers
Acknowledging that all teenagers are unique and have different dietary preferences and needs, Dr Uhlmann shared some tips with EducationDaily on ways parents may like to try to encourage healthier food choices in teenagers:
- Try some experimental cooking. Look up easy healthy recipes together and fun in the kitchen
- Remove temptations – have a variety of fruit and vegetables available at home with minimal discretionary items
- Nudge them in the right direction: sometimes small healthier changes or substitutions are a win and can encourage a willingness for continued improvements
- Don’t give up – They are still watching, learning and forming their relationship with food and, as much as they might deny this, you are actually still their most important ‘influencer’
- Be curious together: empower your teens with unbiased information about nutrition and food systems by watching clips/documentaries, listening to a podcast or talking about commercial determinants of health
- The high school food environment is much broader than the tuckshop/canteen, however as part of my PhD we did interview the high school tuckshop/canteen convenors and undertook a nutritional analysis of the menus using the Smart Choices Strategy
- This will hopefully form the basis of the next journal article, however, in the meantime I would invite the high school community to consider that ‘Amber’ foods are definitely not being selected carefully by teenagers, and that supporting predominantly ‘Green’ food and drinks does not necessarily mean you are jeopardising the viability of the tuckshop/canteen.
