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YALE DAILY NEWS · THURSDAY, JANUARY 23, 2014 · yaledailynews.com
FROM THE FRONT
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The percent of all kids’ meals combinations that meet recommended nutrition standards The Rudd Center also noted in its report that this percent was unchanged from 2010 to 2013.
Fellows program teaches domestic policy FELLOWS FROM PAGE 1 vide a setting for undergraduates to conduct public policy research that is relevant to today’s political decision-making.
It’s nice to take this first step to becoming committed to including Yale College students. RAPH GRAYBILL LAW ’15 “The Director’s Fellowship is the first step in what I hope will be a long movement for making ISPS a center for public policy at Yale,” Hacker said. “I think this is something Yale really needs, and this is just one element of a larger strategy to create endowed fellowships for undergraduates to do research with professors.” The new program, which began accepting applications last fall, was modeled on an existing fellowship for graduate students. Under the guidance of Hacker, three graduate students — Rakim Brooks LAW ’16, Raph Graybill LAW ’15 and Michael Sierra-Arevalo GRD ’18 — will coordinate the undergraduate program and advise fellows. Brooks said he hopes for the undergraduate fellows to learn to communicate policy research in a way that resonates with the public — an essential skill for those who wish to influence policy. ISPS will provide fellows with the high-end research technology, labs and mentors necessary to take their interests to the next level, said Sierra-Arevalo. He added that the program will serve as a breeding ground for further undergraduate public policy work. Graybill said he looks forward to watching the fellows grow as
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Yale’s Institution for Social and Policy Studies, directed by Jacob Hacker GRD ’00, is providing fellowships for 16 undergraduates to conduct public policy research. researchers and connect their interests to impact politics locally and nationally. “This is a really decisive step for public policy at Yale,” he said. “ISPS is one of the premier research institutions in the world, and it’s nice to take this first step to becoming committed to including Yale College students in what we do. We’re really
excited for them to be part of it.” The program’s new undergraduate fellows said they are eager to begin pursuing their respective interests. In his application to the program, Rahul Kini ’15 wrote a mock policy memo that proposed a high school financial literacy requirement. As an economics and mathematics major,
he said, his studies have been primarily method-based, and he hopes to put his ideas into practice as a Director’s Fellow. “I know ISPS tries to address really relevant questions that are best approached in an interdisciplinary way,” he said. Viveca Morris ’15 said she hopes to pursue research related to food and farming policy,
which impacts issues such as global warming, public health and worker’s rights. Morris added that she is a big fan of Jacob Hacker and his team, and hopes to learn the skills necessary to impact agriculture policy from them. “I want to have a tangible impact on the issues I care about,” she said, “To do that,
I need to understand who makes important policy decisions, based on what criteria, and under whose influence — in other words, what actually happens.” The 16 fellows will attend their first seminar on Jan. 29. Contact HAILEY WINSTON at hailey.winston@yale.edu .
Yale researchers take on food policy RUDD FROM PAGE 1 continuing to crusade against the obesity epidemic. Located in a stately house just past Science Hill, the center is on the periphery of most undergraduates’ standard daily radius, and its mission and work remain largely unknown to the undergraduate community. Of 32 students interviewed, only five had heard of the Rudd Center. Yet the center is one of the leading food policy research institutes in the country. “Their impact is extraordinary,” said Tracy Orleans, senior scientist at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, which funds some research at the Rudd Center. “They’re the only group in the country doing work that’s documenting the extent of unhealthy food marketing to children in several domains of the food industry.”
They’re the only group in the country doing work that’s documenting the extent of unhealthy food marketing to children TRACY ORLEANS Senior scientist, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation The center’s mission is to reduce weight stigma and change the world’s diet by creating healthy food environments, and it approaches its mission in a unique way. According to Director Marlene Schwartz, research for the sake of research is foreign to the center. Rather, all of the research conducted by the center explores strategies for crafting the most effective food policies. It’s an approach Schwartz calls “strategic science.” Initiatives have included investigating the effect of unhealthy food advertising on children and how
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changes in welfare food policy impact recipients’ purchases. “We’re really good at studies that look at more concrete and immediate effects of policy,” she said. And since Brownell’s departure, Orleans has seen the same quality of strategic work and research as before. Citing the leadership of Schwartz, who received her Ph.D. at Yale in 1996 under Brownell, Orleans said she believes the center continues to pursue the same research agenda that it has over the past eight years.
SNAP, WIC AND CIGARETTES
The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) was created in 1972 under the Nixon Administration. For years, WIC struggled to provide high-quality, healthy food to its participants. Acco rd i n g to Ta t i a n a Andreyeva, director of Economic Initiatives at the Rudd Center, because of the program’s narrow offerings, participants often used the vouchers to buy milk, juice and cereals — fruits, vegetables and whole wheat bread were not part of the package. The Institute of Medicine released a report in 2005 on the limited package’s effects, and the need for change became apparent. The research showed participants were deficient in vitamins and minerals found in fruits and vegetables, and ingested an unhealthy excess of saturated fats and sodium. Also alarming was the fact that, due to the age demographics of the program, children and infants were beginning life with an unhealthy diet. Four years later in 2009, Congress passed and the president signed a bill aligning the food package with the USDA’s 2005 food guidelines, adding healthier items and scrapping unhealthy ones. The center’s research following the change, comparing availability of healthy food in WICauthorized stores before and after 2009, was encouraging. WIC-
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authorized stores increased the availability and variety of healthy foods, and, notably, the change was most pronounced in lowincome areas. Furthermore, surrounding stores that did not serve WIC recipients also increased their healthy food offerings. The study concluded by noting that by increasing demand for healthy food, government programs could indirectly increase availability and access to it. But changing WIC is easier than changing other supplemental nutrition programs, Andreyeva said. Because WIC involves infants and children, incentivizing healthier choices and disincentivizing unhealthy ones feels less “paternalistic.” We tell children what to do all the time — to an extent, it feels natural for the government to join in, she said. But telling adults how to decide — what to buy and what not to buy in the grocery store — is an uphill battle. About one in seven American rely on SNAP, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program colloquially known as food stamps, to help put food on the table. Despite the reach of the program, SNAP policies were not updated to align with the 2005 USDA guidelines. Andreyeva said SNAP is less likely to see changes than WIC. Instead, Andreyeva said advocates may have to look beyond government food programs to encourage healthy food choices. In the 1990s, the federal government placed a substantial tax on cigarettes. First, in 1990, the tax on cigarettes increased by 8 cents per pack. Then, in 1997, an additional 30 cents per pack was lobbed on. Smoking levels dropped substantially, and especially important in the eyes of public health officials, fewer teens picked up smoking. Andreyeva sees the effectiveness of the cigarette taxes as a lesson to the food policy community. “If you increase the prices of certain foods, like soda, people will definitely buy less,” she said. Because soda consumption is a
predictor of many negative health outcomes, Schwartz said, policy makers looking to find some of the most effective food policies should target decreasing consumption of sugary beverages. This time, however, food and public health policy makers should look for help less from the federal government and more from the states, she said. Still, Andreyeva said the political controversy surrounding a federal soda tax makes passing one unlikely; no state yet has been able to pass a soda tax. Cities have taken up the issue in their stead — with New York City the bestknown example.
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RUDD CENTER TAKES ACTION AGAINST ADVERTISING
The center also emphasizes the importance of creating a healthy food environment from childhood. Jennifer Harris, the center’s director of Marketing Initiatives, researches the way advertising companies target young children. Most of the foods advertised to children are processed foods high in sugar and fat, Harris said. In fact, the foods advertised to children tend to be less healthy than those advertised to adults, she added. The Children’s Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative, a program designed to encourage advertising healthier choices to children, aims to address this problem, and, to a certain extent, regulates what can be advertised to children. But the initiative is run by the television companies themselves, which have little incentive to participate, she said. Harris said First Amendment issues make regulating advertising a challenge, so the Rudd Center is approaching the issue in a different way. Instead of going through regulatory channels, the center is bee-lining to the companies themselves. Harris describes it as “shining a spotlight” on specific companies. For instance, she said calling out specific companies on their advertising practices to children is more effective in spurring change, as blame
cannot be spread throughout the industry.
We’re really good at studies that look at more concrete and immediate effects of policy. MARLENE SCHWARTZ Director, Rudd Center And that spotlight extends to the TV channels responsible for featuring the advertisements. After a 2010 Rudd Center study found that a quarter of all unhealthy food ads targeted at kids aired on Nickelodeon, and a 2012 study conducted by the center for Science in the Public Interest found that 69 percent of foods advertised on Nickelodeon are unhealthy, Harris paired up with U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal LAW ’73 to hold a news conference focused on the effects of advertising unhealthy foods to children. In the conference, Blumenthal announced he would write to Nickelodeon to urge the company — which is not a member of the Children’s Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative — to drop junk food ads. The center has also set up information sites to inform parents of exactly what type of
dietary choices their TV-watching children are being encouraged to make. Sites like cerealfacts.org, fastfoodmarketing.org, and sugarydrinkfacts.org are all part of a larger Rudd project called f.a.c.t.s — Food Advertising to Children and Teens Score, which aims to educate parents about the marketing environment in which their kids are growing up. The Rudd Center is also trying to reform advertising at the source of the obesity epidemic. Harris said marketing in schools exposes young children to unhealthy foods — vending machines with Pepsi logos, scoreboards with CocaCola logos, lunchroom coolers plastered with Gatorade branding, and Ronald McDonald school visits for anti-bullying programs. Rudd Center is producing fact sheets for parents and others to push back against this marketing, as well as working with national organizations including the YMCA and the National Parent Teacher Association to pursue the issue. The Rudd Center’s next report, slated for release this January, focuses on the relationship between student health and academic achievement. Jennifer Gersten contributed reporting. Contact HANNAH SCHWARZ at hannah.schwarz@yale.edu .
BY THE NUMBERS AMERICAN OBESITY 53% 1/3 46 69 Infants in the US receive benefits from the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) U.S. adults are obese
Millions of people who receive food stamp benefits
Millions of customers McDonald’s receives each day
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