Open Access, Peer-reviewed
eISSN 2951-3146
    Korean J Community Nutr. 2020 Apr;25(2):137-149. Korean.
    Published online Apr 30, 2020.
    https://doi.org/10.5720/kjcn.2020.25.2.137
    Copyright © 2020 The Korean Society of Community Nutrition
    Original Article

    Qualitative Study on the Perception of Community Food-accessibility Environment among Urban Older Adults

    Narae Yang,1 and Kirang Kim2
      • 1Department of Food Science and Nutrition, Dankook University, Cheonan, Korea, Graduate Student.
      • 2Department of Food Science and Nutrition, Dankook University, Cheonan, Korea, Professor.
    • Corresponding author: Kirang Kim. Department of Food Science and Nutrition, Dankook University, 119, Dandae-ro, Dongnam-gu, Cheonan 31116, Korea. Tel: (041) 550-3472, Fax: (041) 559-7955, Email: kirangkim@dankook.ac.kr
    Received April 01, 2020; Revised April 16, 2020; Accepted April 17, 2020.

    This is an Open-Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

    Abstract

    Objectives

    This study explored the community food environmental factors affecting food purchasing using a qualitative research methodology for the elderly as well as the various food environments under their socioeconomic diversity.

    Methods

    For the qualitative data collection, this study interviewed 20 elderly people aged 65 years or more, who participated in a public health program or lunch services operated by the senior welfare center in Seoul. Five dimensions, such as availability, physical accessibility, affordability, acceptability, and accommodation suggested in previous studies, were used to identify the community food environmental factors.

    Results

    The elderly participants showed overall similarities to the concepts derived from existing studies on the five dimensions of food accessibility environment. In addition, other important food accessibility environmental factors that were not present in previous studies, such as acceptability for a product of domestic origin, delivery service to home, and small-packaged food sales, were derived. On the other hand, the concept of some subjects differed depending on the household income and specifically for the physical accessibility concept. This showed that the close distance factor from a grocery store at home might not apply to older adults in low-income households in Korea.

    Conclusions

    This study found that five dimensions of the food environment suggested by previous studies could also be applied to vulnerable older adults in Korea. On the other hand, the socioeconomic characteristics of individuals and households would affect the perspectives of their local food environments differently. The findings of this study could help in the development of tools for evaluating the community food environment.

    Keywords
    food environment; older adults; income level; urban; qualitative study

    Tables

    Table 1
    In-depth interview questions

    Table 2
    General characteristics of participants

    Table 3
    Factors related to community food environment for older urban adults

    Acknowledgments

    This research was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF-2019R1A2C1084372).

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    MeSH Terms
    Adult*
    Aged
    Commerce
    Costs and Cost Analysis
    Data Collection
    Family Characteristics
    Hand
    Humans
    Korea
    Lunch
    Program
    Public Health
    Qualitative Research
    Seoul
    Supermarkets
    Metrics
    Share
    Tables
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