University of Oxford, School of Geography and Environment, Environmental Change Institute, UK.
University of British Columbia, Faculty of Land and Food Systems, Centre for Sustainable Food Systems, Canada.
Appetite. 2022 Jan 1;168:105728. doi: 10.1016/j.appet.2021.105728. Epub 2021 Oct 2.
Changes in diets and food practices have implications for personal and planetary health. As these implications have become more apparent, dietary change interventions that seek to promote healthy and sustainable transitions have proliferated, and the processes and drivers of dietary change have come under increasing scrutiny. In particular, dietary acculturation has been recognised as a driver of dietary change in the context of immigration to expanding, cosmopolitan cities. However, research has largely focused on changes in the diets of immigrants and ethnic minorities. In contrast, this study contributes to our understanding of the process of dietary acculturation among the largest population groups in Vancouver, Canada - Chinese- and European-Canadians - in the context of the rapid diversification of the population and food environments in this city. This is done through the analysis of descriptive and contextualised interview and observational data, and a focus on social practices. These data show that food practices, particularly in cosmopolitan urban contexts, are constantly in flux, as diverse ethnic groups come into contact, and new generations develop their own hybrid food cultures. By demonstrating and theorising this process of dietary acculturation, this research offers insights how cultural interactions relate to dietary transitions. It presents an exploratory model for considering how food practices change through dietary acculturation, which is relevant to the design of interventions that aim to support healthier and more sustainable dietary transitions.
饮食和食物习惯的变化对个人和地球健康都有影响。随着这些影响变得越来越明显，旨在促进健康和可持续转型的饮食改变干预措施大量涌现，饮食改变的过程和驱动因素也受到了越来越多的关注。特别是，在移民到不断扩张的国际化大都市的背景下，饮食文化适应已被认为是饮食改变的一个驱动因素。然而，研究主要集中在移民和少数族裔饮食的变化上。相比之下，这项研究通过分析描述性和情境化的访谈和观察数据，以及关注社会习俗，有助于我们理解在加拿大温哥华最大的人群群体——华裔和欧裔加拿大人——在这个城市人口和食物环境迅速多样化的背景下，饮食文化适应的过程。这些数据表明，在国际化的城市环境中，食物习俗尤其在不断变化，因为不同的族裔群体相互接触，新的一代也发展出了自己的混合食物文化。通过展示和理论化这一饮食文化适应过程，这项研究提供了有关文化互动如何与饮食转变相关的见解。它提出了一个探索性的模型，用于考虑通过饮食文化适应来改变食物习俗，这对于设计旨在支持更健康和可持续的饮食转变的干预措施具有重要意义。
