Assessing Dietary Variety in School-Aged Children: Can Three 24-Hour Interval and Consecutive Diet Recalls Predict Dietary Variety Similar to 15 Days of 24-hour Diet Recalls?

by Horner, Stacie Lynn

Objective: Confirm addition of dietary variety slows after 15 days; determine whether three interval 24-hour recalls can capture dietary variety similar to the gold standard 15 days and better than 3 consecutive days. Subjects: Recruited from an elementary school and included children aged 9-12 (n=72). Methods: Fifteen 24-hour recalls were obtained for each subject and three scores calculated for each student: 15 consecutive, 3 interval, and 3 consecutive-day dietary variety scores (DVS). 15-day DVS were predicted from 3 days. Results: Dietary variety levels off after 15 days. Average 15-day cumulative DVS was 43.3; three-day averages were 20.4 and 18.6 from interval and consecutive-day methods respectively. Average predicted 15-day cumulative DVS was 43.4 and 42.5 from 3 interval and 3 consecutive days respectively. Conclusion: DVS can be predicted from 3 days using predictive equations and interval day method was more accurate and precise. This study created and validated predictive equations for 4th and 5th grade population.