Hi Joan,

Thank you for your interest! That is a great idea. The research is needed.

This is mostly a qualitative study. We are using focus groups and photovoice. We are incorporating a short sociodemographic survey at the beginning of each focus group that also includes the USDA six-question food security survey module. We are not collecting BMI, but if you're interested in that connection, I would be happy to speak to you about my thesis project that looked at anthropometry and food insecurity (and menarche).

Participation is volunteer-based. We are recruiting at local after-school programs and community organizations. We explain the research project to them and ask them if they'd like to help us learn about teen food insecurity in their communities. During the focus groups, we never ask the teens to talk about themselves specifically. We do not ask questions in the focus group about the teens participating. Moreover, we ask them to talk about teens in their community (without using any identifiable information). For example, a question will say "how do teens" vs. "how do you".

We are attempting to keep the sample representative for the county. Thus, it will be a diverse sample.

Let me know if you have anymore questions. Feel free to email me at [email protected].