College-Level Nutrition Course Improves Factors Related to Food Security

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the impact of a college-level nutrition course on factors related to food agency. DESIGN: Pre-post study. SETTING: Four-year, large, public, land-grant university. PARTICIPANTS: Students enrolled in Nutrition 10, an introductory nutrition course (n = 1,873), and a comparison group of students not taking the course (n = 1,125) who completed both the pre- and post-surveys over an academic quarter (3 quarters total). VARIABLES MEASURED: The 92-item questionnaire included the Money Expenditure Scale, Coping Strategy Scale, nutrition knowledge, and the 10-item US Department of Agriculture's Adult Food Security Survey Module. ANALYSIS: Wilcoxon ranksum tests, ttests, and regression models examined associations between nutrition knowledge and key variables. Structural equation modeling assessed bidirectional relationships. RESULTS: Students who took the class improved nutrition knowledge (+2.23 ± 5.14 points) compared with a decline in the comparison group (-0.42 points ± 3.55; P < 0.001). Structural equation modeling indicated increased nutrition knowledge was associated with lower Money Expenditure Scale (β = -0.03, P = 0.04) and Coping Strategy Scale (β = -0.17, P < 0.001) scores. CONCLUSION AND IMPLICATIONS: Existing nutrition courses could help improve nutrition knowledge and factors related to food agency. Future research is needed to identify how improvements in nutrition knowledge translate into sustained behavioral changes that enhance food security in higher education.