Katalyst Kreations, LLC — Department of Agriculture SBIR Phase I: 8.5

Description

Testing the effectiveness of a unique innovative easy-to-use programon young children's attitudes about and consumption of fruits and vegetablesa. Response to previous review for "Testing the effectiveness of The Guinea Show on youngchildren's attitudes about and consumption of fruits and vegetables" submitted in 2015.Thank you for the feedback on the application submitted four years ago. The proposed researchnow has intervention and control groups.The study is solely in Hawaii with a subaward to theUniversity of Hawaii.Like last time HCAP Head Start has agreed to offer their classes for thestudy.I have worked with them in the past on other studies. Seagull preschools have alsoagreed. I am confident I can recruit additional classes if needed. This application provides moreinformation on the field test results given during a formative stage and how it affected thedevelopment of The Guinea Show (TGS). The results were quite encouraging which is why Icontinued to work on the project. Some current letters of support are included that state thatchildren exposed to TGS began to eat fruits and vegetables that they had not previously eaten.The video content is unique and innovative.The videos blend health educationpsychology communication and marketing theory and principles employing memorable catchymusic appealing visuals and the power of a messenger with whom young children develop aparasocial relationship. The post-test for the intervention groups uses a reliable subscaledescribed later in the application to measure the affection and friendship dimension of thesepotential parasocial relationships (PR) with Guinea by the children in the study. The PR may beassociated with outcome variables of children's attitudes about and consumption of fruit andvegetables. Growing literature on parasocial relationships with media characters shows they mayprovide comfort and enhance learning (Bond & Calvert 2014). Parents are important rolemodels for children.Young children seem to also regard Guinea as a role model.We have looked for reliable and validated measures and methods in the literature foryoung children. The current ordinal scales to measure attitude and the FV consumption and tasteprotocol came from previous studies.b. Responsiveness to USDA NIFA SBIR Program Priorities:The focus of this proposal --TGS program is in direct alignment with the USDA NIFA ResearchPriority of 8.5-4 Nutrition-Education - "Developing and implementing effective programs foreducators and parents to foster healthy nutritional choices to combat obesity among children." Italso supports "Strategic Goal 7: Provide all Americans Access to a Safe Nutritious and Secure  1  Food Supply." Although various public health efforts provide children more access to FV it iswell known that some will just discard FV.Lack of access to FV is only one barrier toconsumption.TGS program increases the desirability and appeal of FV for young children sothey are more likely to eat FV when given the opportunity. This proposal addresses the RFA thatstates that SBIR will fund projects to"4) develop programs or products that increase theconsumption of healthy foods and reduce obesity. . . . The long-term goals (10 years) of theprogram are to commercialize the production of useful new . . . processes materials and systemsthat reduce . . . obesity . . . or bridge socioeconomic gaps in access to healthy foods." TGSprogram is low-cost.It is easy for preschool and early elementary teachers to use and requireslittle training.It can be used in low resource and rural areas.It can be used to increase theappeal of FV so that programs that provide access to FV will have greater impact rather thanfunds being wasted as the nutritious FV end up in the trash. Nutrition and public healthadvocates have stated the importance of working with young children to