A Multi-Site Analysis of the Prevalence of Food Insecurity in the United States, before and during the COVID-19 Pandemic

  1. Meredith T Niles
  2. Alyssa W Beavers
  3. Lauren A Clay
  4. Marcelle M Dougan
  5. Giselle A Pignotti
  6. Stephanie Rogus
  7. Mateja R Savoie-Roskos
  8. Rachel E Schattman
  9. Rachel M Zack
  10. Francesco Acciai
  11. Deanne Allegro
  12. Emily H Belarmino
  13. Farryl Bertmann
  14. Erin Biehl
  15. Nick Birk
  16. Jessica Bishop-Royse
  17. Christine Bozlak
  18. Brianna Bradley
  19. Barrett P Brenton
  20. James Buszkiewicz
  21. Brittney N Cavaliere
  22. Young Cho
  23. Eric M Clark
  24. Kathryn Coakley
  25. Jeanne Coffin-Schmitt
  26. Sarah M Collier
  27. Casey Coombs
  28. Anne Dressel
  29. Adam Drewnowski
  30. Tom Evans
  31. Beth J Feingold
  32. Lauren Fiechtner
  33. Kathryn J Fiorella
  34. Katie Funderburk
  35. Preety Gadhoke
  36. Diana Gonzales-Pacheco
  37. Amelia Greiner Safi
  38. Sen Gu
  39. Karla L Hanson
  40. Amy Harley
  41. Kaitlyn Harper
  42. Akiko S Hosler
  43. Alan Ismach
  44. Anna Josephson
  45. Linnea Laestadius
  46. Heidi LeBlanc
  47. Laura R Lewis
  48. Michelle M Litton
  49. Katie S Martin
  50. Shadai Martin
  51. Sarah Martinelli
  52. John Mazzeo
  53. Scott C Merrill
  54. Roni Neff
  55. Esther Nguyen
  56. Punam Ohri-Vachaspati
  57. Abigail Orbe
  58. Jennifer J Otten
  59. Sondra Parmer
  60. Salome Pemberton
  61. Zain Al Abdeen Qusair
  62. Victoria Rivkina
  63. Joelle Robinson
  64. Chelsea M Rose
  65. Saloumeh Sadeghzadeh
  66. Brinda Sivaramakrishnan
  67. Mariana Torres Arroyo
  68. McKenna Voorhees
  69. Kathryn Yerxa

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Abstract

No abstract available

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  1. Version published to 10.1093/cdn/nzab135
  2. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2021.07.23.21260280: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    Ethicsnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.
    Cell Line AuthenticationAuthentication: In some more recent surveys (i.e. Massachusetts, NY-Central/Upstate and the second Washington survey) and in Michigan respondents answered questions about food security in the past 30 days, which is validated through the USDA module.

    Table 2: Resources

    Software and Algorithms
    SentencesResources
    NFACT study sites distributed the NFACT surveys (in whole or part) online pursuing one of three sampling strategies: 1) Convenience sampling in partnership with community organizations, stakeholders, social media, and/or news media, which are not representative of a state population (ten sites); 2) Quota sampling using survey panels administered by Qualtrics (Provo, UT), a survey research company, in which the quotas aimed to achieve state representation on some characteristics (e.g. race, ethnicity, income) (eight sites); or 3) Quota or convenience sampling in which certain high-risk populations (e.g. low-income, BIPOC, or Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) participants) were targeted (six sites).
    Nutrition Assistance Program
    suggested: None
    SNAP
    suggested: (SNAP, RRID:SCR_007936)

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:
    Limitations: In presenting our results, we recognize two key limitations. First, research that requires participants to report eating or food-related behaviors is challenged by both recall and social desirability bias (45). Retrospectively asking participants about food insecurity has been shown to lead to overestimation of pre-COVID prevalence of food insecurity (34), suggesting our study may contain similar overestimations. However, we try to address this potential limitation by reporting percent change between pre and during COVID-19 food security, in addition to absolute prevalence of food insecurity, though if the overall pre-pandemic levels of food insecurity are lower, our absolute food insecurity prevalence is likely underestimated. While there has been some skepticism about the high prevalence of food insecurity reported since the COVID-19 pandemic began, our results confirm this high prevalence while providing a more robust measure to benchmark changes. Second, surveys across all research sites included in this study were administered online, limiting respondents to those with computer skills and internet access. This potentially introduced a barrier for some (though not all) elderly or low-income potential respondents (46, 47), as well as those living in rural areas without reliable internet (48). Our study employed a number of methods to overcome this challenge across different sampling strategies. These strategies included partnering with non-profit and community...

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.

    Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.

    Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.

    Results from rtransparent:
    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • No protocol registration statement was detected.

    Results from scite Reference Check: We found no unreliable references.

    About SciScore

    SciScore is an automated tool that is designed to assist expert reviewers by finding and presenting formulaic information scattered throughout a paper in a standard, easy to digest format. SciScore checks for the presence and correctness of RRIDs (research resource identifiers), and for rigor criteria such as sex and investigator blinding. For details on the theoretical underpinning of rigor criteria and the tools shown here, including references cited, please follow this link.

  3. Version published to 10.1101/2021.07.23.21260280v1 on medRxiv