FOOD ASSISTANCE AND NUTRITION RESEARCH SMALL GRANTS PROGRAM: EXECUTIVE SUMMARIES OF 2002 RESEARCH GRANTS

This report summarizes research findings from the Food Assistance and Nutrition Research Small Grants Program. The Economic Research Service created the program in 1998 to stimulate new and innovative research on food assistance and nutrition issues and to broaden the participation of social science scholars in these issues. The report includes summaries of the research projects that were awarded 1-year grants in summer and fall 2001. The results of these research projects were presented at the October 2002 Small Grants Program conference. The projects focus on food insecurity and hunger, nutritional status and diet quality, Federal food assistance program participation, and the role of private-sector organizations in the provision of food assistance. Some projects focus on specific populations, such as people living in the rural South and those living on American Indian reservations.Food assistance, nutrition, vulnerable populations, food security, food insecurity, hunger, hungry, food assistance, food spending, well-being, Food Stamp Program, food stamps, National School Lunch Program, WIC, Food Assistance and Nutrition Research Program, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, Food Security and Poverty,

FOOD ASSISTANCE AND NUTRITION RESEARCH SMALL GRANTS PROGRAM: EXECUTIVE SUMMARIES OF 2001 RESEARCH GRANTS

This report summarizes research findings from the Food Assistance and Nutrition Research Small Grants Program. The Economic Research Service created the program in 1998 to stimulate new and innovative research on food assistance and nutrition issues and to broaden the participation of social science scholars in these issues. The report includes summaries of the research projects that were awarded 1-year grants in summer and fall 2000. The results of these research projects were presented at the 2001 Small Grants Program conference. The projects focus on food insecurity and hunger, nutritional outcomes, and the causes and consequences of food assistance program participation. Some projects focus on specific populations,such as people living in the rural South and on American Indian reservations.Food assistance, nutrition, vulnerable populations, food security, food insecurity, hunger, hungry, food assistance, food spending, well-being, Food Stamp Program, food stamps, National School Lunch Program, WIC, Food Assistance and Nutrition Research Program, Food Security and Poverty,

FOOD ASSISTANCE AND NUTRITION RESEARCH SMALL GRANTS PROGRAM: EXECUTIVE SUMMARIES OF 2003 RESEARCH GRANTS

This report summarizes research findings from the Food Assistance and Nutrition Research Small Grants Program. The Economic Research Service created the program in 1998 to stimulate new and innovative research on food assistance and nutrition issues and to broaden the participation of social science scholars in these issues. The report includes summaries of the research projects that were awarded 1-year grants in summer and fall 2002. The results of these research projects were presented at the November 2003 Small Grants Program conference. The projects focus on food assistance and child well-being, food insecurity and hunger, the dynamics of food assistance program participation, obesity, and the role of community factors in dietary intake and food security. Some projects focus on specific populations, such as people living in the rural South and those living on American Indian reservations.Food assistance, nutrition, vulnerable populations, food security, food insecurity, hunger, hungry, food assistance, food spending, well-being, Food Stamp Program, food stamps, National School Lunch Program, WIC, Food Assistance and Nutrition Research Program, Food Security and Poverty,

WIC Participation Patterns: An Investigation of Delayed Entry and Early Exit

USDA’s Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) provides nutritious foods, nutrition counseling, and referrals to health and other social services to low-income women and their infants/children up to age 5. Despite the health benefits of WIC participation, many eligible women do not participate during pregnancy, and many households exit WIC when a participating child turns 1 year old. The authors of this report use the first two waves of the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Birth Cohort (ECLS-B) to understand these transitions into and out of WIC. Findings show that households that are more economically advantaged are more likely to delay entry into the program or exit after a child turns 1 year old. Some of the mothers exiting the program reported that WIC requires too much effort and that its benefits are not worth the time (26.2 percent of those exiting) or that they have scheduling and transportation problems (almost 10 percent of those exiting), suggesting that the costs of participation may be a barrier to continued WIC participation.Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, WIC, participation dynamics, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, Food Security and Poverty,

Climate Change and the Inescapable Present

The crisis of climate change is a difficult phenomenon to conceptualize, particularly in light of how we experience time and how our consciousness works. It is an event that spans tense in ways that are difficult to pinpoint, and it provides no past precedent to shape our future anticipations. Furthermore, climate change encounters us at a moment when time also feels compressed. This paper explores climate change and its relationship to time by assessing how theatre, with its own phenomenologically unique qualities of time and experience, has portrayed these tensions. Utilizing phenomenological theories of time from Husserl and Heidegger, and drawing on philosophical and cultural theories of presentism, this paper examines how these ideas manifest in two climate change plays: Moira Buffini, Matt Charman, Penelope Skinner, and Jack Thorne’s Greenland (2011) and Stephen Emmott’s Ten Billion (2012). In conclusion, it is argued that theatre’s own conventions of time and space allows an inescapable present to exist, in which audiences are given a phenomenological experience of climate change that is otherwise unparalleled

Virtual Ethics and the CREEPER Act

A legal and moral discussion of the development of child sex bots (CSB), childlike sex dolls, comparing society-at-large’s general squeamishness of the area, and attempts to regulate (for example, the CREEPER Act) with the prophylactic therapeutic benefits of these robots

The Role of Media Outreach and Program Modernization in the Growth of the SNAP Caseload

This research seeks to understand the role of information, in the form of media campaigns, and changes in transaction costs, in the form of online applications and call centers, in the growth in county-level SNAP caseloads. We find that SNAP radio advertisements are associated with a small increase in the SNAP caseload, though the magnitude of the estimates are sensitive to the econometric specification. The SNAP television ads, which were run only in 2006, are negatively correlated with caseloads. We find evidence of endogeneity in the placement of the advertising campaigns, leading to a positive bias in the estimated effect of the radio ad campaigns and a negative bias in the estimated effect of the TV ad campaigns. We also find the modernization policies are generally negatively correlated with caseloads, suggesting that providing information via the web and call centers did not successfully lower transaction costs in a uniform way that lead to higher SNAP participation.Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, SNAP, food stamps, food assistance, outreach, advertising, Consumer/Household Economics, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, Food Security and Poverty, H53, I3,

Trends in Food Pantry Use Since Welfare Reform: Evidence from the Kansas City Metropolitan Area

This study uses a unique database to examine the trend in the use of food pantries in the Kansas City metropolitan area from 1997 to 2000. We find a slight increase in the use of food pantry services over this period, less than one percent annually. This is a much smaller increase than has been reported in other studies, but consistent with recent research that uses a series of national cross-sectional household surveys to document changes in food pantry use (Tiehen 2002). In addition to examining trends in food pantry use, this study assesses the effect that accounting for providers who cease operations has on estimates of the change in food pantry use derived from a cross-sectional sample of emergency food providers. We conclude that in the absence of information from exiting agencies, the estimated growth rate can be gravely overstated, at least in terms of the number of services provided.This research was funded by the Economic Research Service, United States Department of Agriculture, Cooperative Agreement 433AEM180068.Includes bibliographical reference

Transitions into and out of the WIC Program: A Cause for Concern?

Despite the health benefits of participation in the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), many eligible households do not participate in WIC during pregnancy and others exit WIC after a child turns one year old. This research uses the first two waves of the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Birth Cohort (ECLS-B) to advance our understanding of these transitions into and out of WIC. Findings suggest that those who exhibit better economic health across a variety of dimensions are more likely to delay entry into the program or exit after a child turns one year of age