Our Year of Healthy Living: A social marketing intervention for child care & home

幼儿期是建立健康饮食和体育活动行为的关键时期， 影响儿童患肥胖症和其他慢性病的短期和长期风险。不幸的是，在此期间， 重要的发展阶段，许多学龄前儿童已经采取了不健康的饮食和体育 活动行为。家庭和儿童保育是影响幼儿饮食的两个重要领域 和身体活动行为。使这两个领域参与协调努力的干预措施将确保 儿童得到一致的健康信息。很少有干预措施是针对 儿童保育，其中许多没有试图让父母参与。其中包括一位家长 组件通常使用低强度策略（例如，时事通讯、家庭作业）。创新 让幼儿中心和家长以实质性和有意义的方式参与的方法是 needed.社会营销已被确定为健康促进工作的一个有前途的方法， 孩子社会营销负责人认识到，有必要让所有的个人参与进来，他们的行为必须 受影响的人带来变化，并提供强调好处和克服障碍的信息 与行为改变有关。社会营销原理在幼儿护理中的应用 干预措施非常有限。这项研究是一项两组随机对照试验（86个中心和860名 儿童），以评估为期12个月的干预-我们的健康生活年-对饮食和 学龄前儿童（3-4岁）及其成年照顾者（父母和儿童照顾者）的身体活动行为 供应商）。干预将使用一系列的社会营销活动发起的儿童护理中心 包括视觉提示、教育材料、活动、竞赛和电子信息， 充分和传播这项研究的主要结果是儿童的非久坐活动分钟数（通过 加速度计）和饮食质量（用健康饮食指数评分评估）。次要结局将 评估：儿童的身体质量指数，在儿童保育中心和家中的食物和身体活动实践， 和儿童保育提供者和父母的健康行为。

Early childhood is a critical period for establishing healthy diet and physical activity behaviors that may influence chidlren's short- and long-term risk for obesity and other chronic diseases. Unfortunately, during this important stage of development, many preschool children have already adopted unhealthy diet and physical activity behaviors. Home and child care are two important spheres of influence that shape young children's diet and physical activity behaviors. Interventions engaging both spheres in a coordinated effort would ensure that children receive consistent health messages. There have been very few interventions that have targeted the child care seeting, many of which made no attempt to engage parents. Those that did include a parent component generally used low-intensity strategies (e.g., newsletters, homework assignments). Innovative approaches that engage both the child care center and parents in a substantial and meaningful way are needed. Social marketing has been identified as a promising approach for health promotion efforts targeting children. Social marketing principals recognize the need to engage all individuals whose behaviors must be affected to bring about change, and to offer messages that emphasize benefits, and overcome barriers associated with behavior change. The application of social marketing principles in child care-based interventions is very limited. The proposed study is a two-arm, randomized controlled trial (86 centers and 860 children) to evaluate the effect of a 12-month intervention - Our Year of Healthy Living - on the diet and physical activity behaviors of preschool children (3-4 years) and their adult caregivers (parents and child care providers). The intervention will use a series of social marketing campaigns initiated in the child care center that incorporate visual cues, educational materials, activities, contests, and e-messages to deliver targeted messages. This study's primary outcomes are children's minutes of non-sedentary activity (measured via accelerometers) and diet quality (assessed with Healthy Eating Index scores). Secondary outcomes will assess: children's body mass index, food and physical activity practices in the child care center and at home, and health behaviors of child care providers and parents.