This integrated project combines research and education to improve understanding and training related to environmental and behavioral factors that influence obesity. The primary aim of the research project was to document the association between characteristics of the nutrition and activity environments, dietary behaviors and physical activity among parents of young children, after adjusting for psychosocial and socioeconomic variables. The study built on an ongoing NIH-funded study that investigates the multilevel correlates of physical activity, nutrition, and obesity in children in forty Seattle and San Diego neighborhoods (Neighborhood Influences on Kids or NIK).
We conducted the Built Environment Assessment Training (BEAT) Institute between 2008-2012 to prepare young investigators and early-career practitioners to use both observational and self-report measures of nutrition and activity environments and related behavioral assessments. There was a BEAT Think Tank held in 2013.
http://www.med.upenn.edu/BEAT/