About
54
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Introduction
Lecturer, researcher and Nutrition Discipline Lead - Bachelor of Health Science, Edith Cowan University (ECU). Chair National Nutrition Network – Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC).Expertise in community nutrition intervention design and development, knowledge brokerage and translation to improve population health outcomes, ECEC food provision, food literacy, research translation for impact, higher education teaching and learning.
Current institution
Additional affiliations
January 2010 - present
January 2010 - August 2016
Education
January 2016 - December 2021
January 2012 - December 2013
January 2011 - December 2012
Publications
Publications (54)
A rapid transformation to sustainable agricultural production systems is necessary, requiring on-farm monitoring and measurements of key agricultural sustainability indicators. While many assessment methods for agricultural sustainability incorporate a three-pillar model of sustainability: environment, economic, and social, a step beyond this is re...
Background
Effective interventions to increase vegetable intake are urgently needed. This systematic rapid review aimed to summarise the effectiveness of interventions targeting increased vegetable intakes across diverse settings.
Methodology
The review was guided by the conduct of rapid reviews from the Cochrane Handbook. The literature was searc...
This study evaluated the effectiveness of an online short course based on the Health Promoting Schools Framework and specifically designed for Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) professionals. The short course aimed to enhance ECEC professionals' nutrition knowledge, confidence, role legitimacy and adequacy to model healthy behaviours, teach...
This article reports on a desktop evidence review of Australian public universities work-integrated learning policies and procedures. The review examined the availability and accessibility of these documents to prospective students with disability, as well as their inclusivity and quality, against three dimensions developed from analysis of equity...
In the original publication [...]
Inclusive work-integrated learning (WIL) requires collaboration between universities, host organizations and students, particularly, when designing and delivering WIL for students with disabilities. Host organizations, however, are not often included in the collaborations. This study explored host organization knowledge, capacity and challenges to...
Background
The COVID-19 pandemic has revealed the fragility of the global food system, sending shockwaves across countries' societies and economy. This has presented formidable challenges to sustaining a healthy and resilient lifestyle. The objective of this study is to examine the food consumption patterns and assess diet diversity indicators, pri...
Children need to be repeatedly and consistently exposed to a variety of vegetables from an early age to achieve an increase in vegetable intake. A focus on enjoyment and learning to like eating vegetables at an early age is critical to forming favourable lifelong eating habits. Coordinated work is needed to ensure vegetables are available and promo...
Background:
Previous research has suggested that toddlers are not provided with adequate dietary iron in long-day care (LDC) services. However, the iron bioavailability provided is unknown. The present study aimed to investigate the amount and bioavailability of iron provided to toddlers aged 2-3 years at LDC services.
Methods:
A cross-sectional...
Issue addressed:
Early childhood education and care (ECEC) settings are ideal environments to optimise nutrition and positively influence children's food behaviours. However, recent research has identified the need to improve nutrition policies, food provision, and mealtime environments in Australian ECEC settings. This study explored the percepti...
https://doi.org/10.1017/S0029665123001556
Issue addressed:
Locating fast-food outlets near schools is a potential public health risk to schoolchildren, given the easy access and repeated exposure to energy-dense, nutrient-poor foods they provide. Fast-food outlet availability near schools has not been previously investigated in Perth, Western Australia. This study aimed to quantify fast-f...
Australian families increasingly rely on eating foods from outside the home, which increases intake of energy-dense nutrient-poor foods. ‘Kids’ Menus’ are designed to appeal to families and typically lack healthy options. However, the nutritional quality of Kids’ Menus from cafes and full-service restaurants (as opposed to fast-food outlets) has no...
Background:
Children aged 2-11 years spend significant hours per week in early childhood education and care (ECEC) and primary schools. Whilst considered important environments to influence children's food intake, there is heterogeneity in the tools utilised to assess food provision in these settings. This systematic review aimed to identify and e...
Obesity and mental health disorders are rising simultaneously with shifting dietary behavior away from home cooking, toward typically nutrition-poor and energy-dense convenience meals. Food literacy strongly influences nutrition choices. Community-based cooking interventions target barriers to healthy eating and facilitate development of food liter...
Abstract Background Outside-of-school-hours-care (OSHC) services are well positioned to influence the health behaviours of 489, 800 Australian children, and are an important setting for health promotion given the current rates of childhood overweight and obesity and associated health risks. OSHC Professionals are ideally placed to become positive i...
Employability skills can be categorised as ‘people’ or ‘soft skills’ and ‘technical’ or ‘industry specific’ skills. Australian employers are increasingly seeking to employ university graduates with well-developed people skills. Evidence from industry suggests these skills, in particular communication skills are lacking in today’s graduates. The aim...
The global COVID-19 pandemic has necessitated a rapid shift to online delivery in higher education. This learning and teaching environment is associated with reduced student engagement, a crucial prerequisite of student satisfaction, retention and success. This paper presents a case study that explored student engagement in the synchronous virtual...
The global COVID-19 pandemic has necessitated a rapid shift to online delivery in higher education. This learning and teaching environment is associated with reduced student engagement, a crucial prerequisite of student satisfaction, retention and success. This paper presents a case study that explored student engagement in the synchronous virtual...
Purpose
Rates of drinking- and alcohol-related harms among older adults are increasing in most developed nations. The purpose of this paper was to explore the relationship among at-risk alcohol use, smoking, gender, geographical location, self-reported health and psychological well-being among Western Australians aged 65 years and older.
Design/me...
Objectives: To examine changes in planning, selecting, and preparing healthy foods in relation to personal factors (time, money, stress) and social distancing policies during the COVID-19 crisis.
Methods: Using cross-sectional online surveys collected in 38 countries worldwide in April-June 2020 (N = 37,207, Mage 36.7 SD 14.8, 77% women), we compa...
Early childhood is a critical stage for nutrition promotion, and childcare settings have the potential for wide-reaching impact on food intake. There are currently no Australian national guidelines for childcare food provision, and the comparability of existing guidelines across jurisdictions is unknown. This project aimed to map and compare childc...
Background
Early Childhood Education & Care (ECEC) services are a public health setting that influences the lifelong eating habits and health of young Australians. Over 1.3 million children attend ECEC for 30 hours/week. Overweight/obesity, a risk factor for chronic disease, has been associated with this setting. Research reports sub-optimal food p...
Background:
Australia, like other nations, has experienced a shift in dietary patterns away from home cooking of nutritious foods, towards a reliance on pre-prepared convenience meals. These are typically energy-dense, nutrient-poor and contribute to the rising prevalence of obesity and chronic disease burden. The aims of this study were to evalua...
Early childhood education and care services are a significant feature of Australian family life, where nearly 1.4 million children attended a service in 2019. This paper reports on the cost of food provided to children in long day-care (LDC) services and extrapolates expenditure recommendations to support food provision compliance. A cross-sectiona...
Aim:
To assess Australian Early Childhood Education and Care Services (ECEC) staff on their preparedness to manage children with food allergy (FA) and anaphylaxis.
Methods:
An online survey addressing training, knowledge, skills and staff confidence to manage FA and anaphylaxis was emailed to 5956 ECEC services nationally (excluding Western Aust...
BACKGROUND:
There are currently 1.3 million children utilising Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) services in Australia. Long day care (LDC), family day care and out of school hours care currently provide this service in different environments. This research reports findings from a LDC perspective. Children can consume 40-67% of their food i...
Large-scale food system practices have diminished soil and water quality and negatively impacted climate change. Yet, numerous opportunities exist to harness food system practices that will ensure better outcomes for human health and ecosystems. The objective of this study was to consider food Production, Processing, Access and Consumption domains,...
Building on the success of the SNAC (Supporting Nutrition Australian Childcare) community, a comprehensive online programme SNAC Plus provided professional development (PD) and resources to embed nutrition curriculum and supportive food environments in Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) services. Process and impact evaluation were conducted...
Food literacy is seen as a key component in improving the increasing levels of food insecurity. While responsibility for providing training falls on the charitable service organizations, they may not have the capacity to adequately reach those in need. This paper proposes a tertiary education - (university or higher education) led model to support...
With the increase in prevalence of food allergy (FA) in young children, early childhood education and care (ECEC) providers are likely to have more enrolments of children who are at risk of anaphylaxis. This study examines the status of FA management in ECEC, and assesses the services’ current readiness to prevent and manage FA. A cross-sectional s...
Food Futures Conference, Brisbane 2018
Local Government, food systems, sustainable food, regenerative agricultures, Healthy Soil Healthy Communities, food security,
Long day care, food provision, chilcare, menu
land use, healthy food environment, town planners, local government, urban designers, policy
food allergy, childcare, long day care, Early childhood education and care, ECEC
Food waste is under more scrutiny as a result of climate change, projected population growth and sustainability questions including future needs and equitable solutions for global food security. It is now an integral part of government agendas and action to reduce it is promoted globally by the Sustainable Development Goals. There is evidence that...
THE EARLY YEARS SETTING IS AN UNDERUTILISED ENTRY POINT TO BUILD HEALTHY FOOD ENVIRONMENTS
A. Devine, R. Wallace, L. Costello, R. Sambell, S. Baker, K. Lombardi, K.Forde, M. Miller.
Edith Cowan University, WA, Australia
E-mail address: adevine@ecu.edu.au (A. Devine).
Background/Aims:Eating habits are formed early in life;>1 million children spen...
MISSED OPPORTUNITY IN CHARITABLE FOOD SECTOR!
A. Devine 1, A. Douglas-Watson 1, R. Sambell 1, T. Lawlis 2.
1 School of Medical and Health Science, Edith Cowan University, Joondalup, WA, Australia;
2 School of Public Health and Nutrition, University of Canberra, ACT, Australia
E-mail address: a.devine@ecu.edu.au (A. Devine).
Background/Aims: Nutr...
Supporting academic engagement and acculturation of international master of public health students.
The purpose of this paper is twofold: firstly, to report on a pilot study that determined food provision within early years (EY) settings and compared these with recommendations that >50% of the Australian Dietary Guidelines (ADG) standard serves should be provided to children in care; and secondly, to explore how high-school home economics student...
