Bringing Policy and Practice to the Table - Young Women’s Nutritional Experiences in an Ontario Secondary School

Oct 15, 2026

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Media, health organizations, and researchers have raised concerns about the health of Canadian children and adolescents, urging government action. Schools are treated as ideal sites for large-scale interventions because they provide access to broad student populations. In Ontario, nutrition policies such as the School Food and Beverage Policy aim to improve young people’s health. This study examines eating behaviours and nutrition knowledge among young women (ages 14–17) through twenty semi-structured interviews and finds the impact of parents, limits on applying learned nutrition knowledge, and challenges in changing school-based eating behaviours.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryHealthcare

FormatPDF

Pages14

Reading Time35 min

AccessFree to download

Abstract

Introduction

Review of the Literature

Eating Behaviours of Canadian Adolescents

Nutrition Education and School Food Policies in Ontario

Bringing Policy and Practice to the Table: Young Women’s Nutritional Experiences in an Ontario Secondary School Sarah K. Gray University of Toronto Abstract In recent years, media, health organizations and researchers have raised concern over the health of Canadian children and adolescents. Stakeholders have called on the government to confront the problem. Schools are seen as an ideal location for developing and implementing large-scale interventions because of the ease of access to large groups of children and adolescents. Within Ontario, new nutrition policies, such as the School Food and Beverage Policy (Ontario Ministry of Education, 2010) have been implemented, in an attempt to change the current health status of children and adolescents. The purpose of this study was to examine the eating behaviours and nutrition knowledge of young women in an Ontario secondary school. Twenty semi-structured interviews with young women between the ages of 14 and 17 years old were used to examine the reproduction, negotiation and resistance to the nutrition messages received by the young women within the school environment. The interviews revealed the influence parents have on the nutrition knowledge and behaviours of their children, the inability of adolescents to apply learned nutrition knowledge and the ineffectiveness of the school environment in influencing eating behaviours. Keywords: nutrition education, school nutrition policies, young women, nutrition knowledge, eating behaviours Sarah K. Gray is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Exercise Science in the Faculty ofKinesiology and Physical Education at The University of Toronto. She is also a secondary school teacher with the Halton District School Board in Ontario. Her current research explores sex, gender as well as its intersections within health and physical education and policy. Email: [sarahk.gray@utoronto.ca](sarahk.gray@utoronto.ca) Introduction In recent years, the media, politicians, government agencies and researchers have raised concerns over the current health and body shapes of children and adolescents (Active Healthy Kids, 2012; CBC News, 2009; Hodgson, 2012) . Fear and concern over an ‘obesity epidemic’ has been propagated in the minds of the public through a number of vehicles and has resulted in the implementation of a number of physical education policies (Evans, Davies, & Wright, 2004; Evans, Rich, Davies, & Allwood, 2008; Gard & Wright, 2001) . For Canadian youth, 12 to 17 years old, a recent Statistics Canada report classified 20.9% of girls and 18.9% of boys as overweight while 9.6% of girls and 10.7% of boys were classified as obese (Roberts, Shields, de Groh, Aziz, & Gilbert, 2012). Although data used for documenting the ‘obesity epidemic’ is over 30 years old, concern over the ‘epidemic’ is a relatively new phenomenon and corresponds to neoliberal discourses of monitoring and self-regulation (Gard & Wright, 2005) . The use of the term‘obesity epidemic’ is called into question because the research to support the notion is considered by some academics to be flawed or exaggerated due to poor methodology, analysis, misleading facts, et cetera (Campos, Saguy, Ernsberger, Oliver, & Gaesser, 2006; Gard & Wright, 2005) . Media and health professionals often refer to past generations as being more active and eating well. This forms the foundation for their arguments that ‘modernity’ and current ‘Western lifestyles’ are making people ‘fat’ (Gard & Wright, 2005) . The message relayed by health professionals and media is that Canadian youth are eating too much and not engaging in enough physical activity (Active Healthy Kids, 2012; Branswell, 2012) . Youth are often considered unable to monitor their behaviours therefore the responsibility shifts towards the parents and schools (Kirk & Spiller, 1994) . Review of the Literature To contextual the study, it is important to understand the eating behaviours of Canadian adolescents and establish

FAQs

What is the purpose of the study described in the document?

The study examines the eating behaviours and nutrition knowledge of young women in an Ontario secondary school.

How was the study conducted?

It used twenty semi-structured interviews with young women aged 14 to 17 to examine how they reproduce, negotiate, and resist nutrition messages in the school environment.

What key findings are reported from the interviews?

The interviews highlight parents’ influence on nutrition knowledge and behaviours, adolescents’ limited ability to apply learned nutrition knowledge, and the ineffectiveness of the school environment in shaping eating behaviours.

Oct 15, 2026

Upload by Ben