April 2-4, 2020 • Hyatt Regency • Lexington, KY
Intersectionality and Interdisciplinarity in Health Communication Research
Intersectionality and Interdisciplinarity in Health Communication Research
Abstract: A Communication Inequalities Approach to Disparities in Fruit and Vegetable Consumption
This study assessed whether socioeconomic disparities in fruit and vegetable consumption and its differences by social capital (i.e., resources embedded within one’s social networks) are accounted for by exposure to information about fruits and vegetables from mediated sources and elaborative processing of that information (i.e., reflective integration) and whether education and income are positively associated with social capital. Online survey data were collected in July 2014 from 572 U.S. adults from a nationally representative online panel (KnowledgePanel). Participants were asked to report, on average, how many servings of fruit/vegetables they ate or drank per day the week before. Responses ranged from less than one serving per day (0) to 5 or more servings per day (5). Reflective integration was measured by asking respondents on a 3-point scale (1 = not at all, 2 = 1 or 2 times, 3 = 3 times or more) how often they have done the following: for instance, “I tried to relate the information about fruits and vegetables that I learned from the media to my own personal experiences.” Media exposure was measured by asking respondents to report on a 3-point scale (1 = not at all, 2 = 1 or 2 times, 3 = 3 times or more) how often they had actively looked for information about fruits and vegetables in the past 12 months and how often they had encountered information about fruits and vegetables when they were not actively looking for it. Position generator was used to measure social capital. Respondents were asked “Of your relatives, friends, and acquaintances, do you happen to know someone who is…” The list includes 22 occupations with different job prestige score. Education was measured by asking respondents to report their highest educational degree received, which ranged from 1 = no formal education to 14 = professional or doctorate degree. Income was measured using a 19-point scale (1 = less than $5,000 to 19 = 175,000 or more). Path analysis was employed to test our mediation models. The full path model achieved adequate fit for the data, χ2(7) = 10.65, p > .05, CFI = .99, TLI = .93, RMSEA = .03, 90% CI [.00 - .07], SRMR = .01. Both education and social capital were positively associated with media exposure, which was in turn positively related to reflective integration and finally led to fruit and vegetable consumption (education’s indirect effect β = .021, p = .011; social capital’s indirect effect β = .018, p = .016). In addition, both education and income were positively associated with social capital, which was in turn positively associated with media exposure and the subsequent reflective integration and finally led to fruit and vegetable consumption (education’s indirect effect β = .004, p = .036; income’s indirect effect β = .003, p = .057).