Perspectives of Community Health Advocates: Barriers to Healthy Family Eating Patterns

Community health advocates in health disparity zip codes participated in a focus group to identify beliefs and barriers to frequent, healthy family meals and communication at dinnertime. Barriers to family meals included busy schedules, insufficient space to gather together, picky eaters, socioeconomic factors, need to educate, limited grocery stores, lack of cooking skills, and meal planning deficiencies. Barriers to communication included modern electronics, generational differences, and financial stress. Findings from this study may help raise awareness of some of the challenges that families residing in health disparity zip codes face.