Dalia Stern, PhD won an Graduate Education Advancement Board Impact Award, recognizing research discoveries that contribute to better futures for people in North Carolina, for her research analyzing where people shopped for food, which foods they purchased and the nutrient profile of their purchases. Dr. Stern’s project, titled Do More Food Shopping Options Lead to Healthier Decisions? analyzed nutritional profiles of purchases from various store types and found that while grocery stores account for the majority of U.S. household food purchases, a growing volume of packaged food is purchased through mass merchandisers, and no nutritionally meaningful differences were found in foods purchased from each different type of store.
Stern’s research suggests that future food policies focused on improving eating habits should go beyond healthy food access to incorporate consumers’ complex shopping behavior—and their ease in locating less nutritious food and beverages in all stores.
Dr. Stern was one of four awardees from the Gillings School of Global Public Health. Read more about Dalia’s work and the work from other awardees here.