Long-Term Patterns of Food Insecurity and Health Status among School-Aged Children

With sharp increases in the national food insecurity rate over the past several years due to the economic recession, food insecurity has become an issue of public policy as well as public concern. Although past research has demonstrated the associations between food insecurity and a wide array of negative health outcomes in children, little is known about the long-term patterns of food insecurity and the implications of differing patterns of food insecurity for child health outcomes. Using four waves of data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Kindergarten Cohort 1998-1999 (ECLS-K), this study examines the long-term patterns of food insecurity over multiple years in childhood and the cumulative effects of these patterns on children's health status.;This dissertation includes three empirical papers. The first paper describes the long-term dynamics of food insecurity from kindergarten through eighth grade with a focus on examining persistence and severity. Results suggest that food insecurity is generally a transient rather than a persistent condition, and that single-year estimates substantially underestimate the share of children whose households experienced food insecurity at some point during their childhood years. Using logistic regression models, the second paper estimates the cumulative impacts of food insecurity over the observation years on eighth grade health status. Using a summary measure for cumulative exposures to food insecurity over the 9-year period, the analyses demonstrate that persistent food insecurity is associated with lower health status in eighth grade, whereas more transient food insecurity is not significantly associated with health in eighth grade. Moreover, the negative health effect of food insecurity is found in a more moderate level of food insecurity--not just a severe level. The third paper hypothesizes that the biological vulnerability of being born low birthweight would further strengthen the association between food insecurity and changes in health status. However, results show no clear evidence of moderating effects of low birthweight.;Findings of this study demonstrate that the detrimental impact of food insecurity, particularly persistent food insecurity, on child health is an important public policy issue. Policy interventions to alleviate children's food insecurity may promote child health and well-being.