TDNet Discover

The purpose of this quantitative study was to analyze the relationship between food insecurity and self-reported health-related quality of life (HRQOL) mentally and physically unhealthy days in California and Texas. Despite efforts to advance health equity, health disparities exist, and all Americans are not afforded health at its highest level. For more than four decades, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has implemented programs to address health disparities. Although there are many contributing factors related to health conditions, the foundation of eliminating health disparities is healthy food. This study used 2011- 2021 publicly available secondary data gathered from the Current Population Survey Food Security Supplement (CPS-FSS) and the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) survey. Using normally distributed data, confirmed by the Shapiro-Wilk test, a Pearson correlation coefficient r analysis was conducted to answer the research question and test the hypotheses. Findings showed that there was a statistically insignificant positive linear relationship between food insecurity and physically unhealthy days in both states, ranging from weak to moderate strength. Additionally, there was a statistically insignificant very weak positive linear correlation between food insecurity and mentally unhealthy days in California. In Texas, the analysis returned a statistically insignificant moderate negative correlation between food insecurity and mentally unhealthy days. In all analyses, study findings failed to reject the null hypothesis. The practical significance of this study was the existence of the relationship and positive trends between food insecurity and HRQOL, which supports the literature and the need to enhance federal and state frameworks to advance health equity. Findings provide valuable insights for leaders and decision-makers to consider in developing strategic frameworks and addressing food insecurity to improve the health and well-being of individuals.