Context

Latin America has among the highest rates of overweight and obesity in the world, with adult prevalence of obesity around 23%, adult overweight above 50% , and childhood obesity and overweight over 20%. This prevalence marks a rise in overweight and obesity in the past thirty years that is driven by changing food environments and social norms.

The environments in which people live make eating ultra-processed foods and irregular exercise easy, accessible, social, and timely. Moreover, social influences at home and in communities inform dietary practices and the attitudes about body size. As people adopt similar practices and ways of thinking about food and health, these views become shared social norms within families, communities, and groups of people.

To gain insights into the development of social norms, UNICEF LACRO commissioned MAGENTA to conduct a qualitative study on social norms around dietary practices and body image.

Objectives

1. To better understand how environmental, social, and psycho-logical factors influence social norms on dietary practices and body image.

2. To develop an evidence base that informs programming and policy suggestions at the regional and national levels.

What We Did & Found

MAGENTA generated insights into the dietary practices and attitudes about body size through participatory social norms measurement and qualitative journey mapping. Through a scoping literature review, 36 focus group discussions with adolescents and adults in Colombia, Guatemala, and Mexico and 30 key informant interviews with stakeholders from the public, private and civil society sectors, MAGENTA documented decision-making processes, preferences, practices and expectations around food, beverages, and body sizes that are informing the development of UNICEF’s regional and country programming for the prevention of overweight.

Across all three countries, the study found that environmental and social factors drive the ways that people eat and the attitudes that they hold about health. The organization of people’s environments, from the accessibility and affordability of ultra-processed foods and the density of street vendors to the gendered division of household labor, impacted what they chose and considered aspirational to eat. This psychological perception about what is accessible, affordable, and aspirational impacted individual decision making and contributed to normative behaviors and practices around nutrition and health.

Our Social & Behavioural Insights

• Limited policy continuity between governing entities incentivizes short-term food policies.

• Limited road infrastructure in rural areas hinders organizations’ transporting of perishable foods in and out of the areas.

• Limited pedestrian infrastructure in rural and urban areas hinders people’s ability to walk and exercise regularly.

• Limited regulation of ultra-processed foods increases their availability, affordability, and variety.

• Affect bias encourages emotion-based food decision making.

• Salience bias focuses con prominent items of health information.

• Low self-efficacy demotivates individuals to take charge of their health.

• Ambivalent health interest and attitudes contributes to low motivation to make health changes.

• Social influence of adults informs children’s food and health interests and attitudes.

• Community dynamics encourage eating out for recreation and celebration and discussing health topics at home.

• Gender norms assign meal preparation and serving to women and girls.

• Meta norms consider thinner bodies to be healthier than larger bodies.

What we recommended

• Develop governing instruments to regulate exposure and access to ultra-processed foods and beverages and expand food policy initiatives.

• Create and promote built infrastructure that facilitates health-forward decisions.

• Increase interest, positive associations, and cultural identification with nutritionally rich foods.

• Increase individual’s self-efficacy to support their health through initiatives aimed at building capability and motivation to include health-forward habits.

• Foster public discourses and community dynamics that promote nutrition-forward and body neutral conversations around health.

• Promote gender equality and increase men and adolescent boy’s engagement in meal preparation and in creating healthy habits early and often at home.