Food adaptation and nutrient intake of female immigrants into Korea through marriage

Ji-Myung Kim; Hee Seung Lee; Min Hwa Kim

doi:10.4163/kjn.2012.45.2.159

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Kim, Lee, and Kim: Food adaptation and nutrient intake of female immigrants into Korea through marriage

Research Article

Korean Journal of Nutrition

Korean Journal of Nutrition 2012; 45(2): 159-169.

Published online: 27 April 2012

DOI: https://doi.org/10.4163/kjn.2012.45.2.159

Food adaptation and nutrient intake of female immigrants into Korea through marriage

Ji-Myung Kim¹, Hee Seung Lee¹, Min Hwa Kim²

¹Department of Food and Nutritional Sciences, Hanbuk University, Dongducheon 483-120, Korea.

²Department of Child Care and Education, Hanbuk University, Dongducheon 483-120, Korea.

To whom correspondence should be addressed. (doublekim@hanmail.net)

Received 20 March 2012 Revised 2 April 2012 Accepted 5 April 2012

(open-access):

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

The purpose of this study was to investigate Korean food adaption, eating behavior and dietary intakes of married female immigrants by age, number of residence years in Korea and level of income. The survey included 67 female marriage immigrants attending the Korean language class at the multicultural family support center within the northern part of Kyonggi province from October 2010 to July 2011. General characteristics, Korean dietary life adaptation, and eating behavior were collected and dietary intakes were assessed using 24-hour recall. The home countries with regards to all subjects were Vietnam (40.3%), China (23.9%), Japan (11.9%), Philippines (7.0%), and Mongolia (3.0%). Total energy intake was 1432.5kcal and there were significant differences in nutritional intake concerning vitamin B1 and vitamin B₂ by age (p < 0.05). More than 50% of subjects did not meet estimated average requirements for calcium (56.7%), zinc (52.2%), vitamin C (55.2%), and folic acid (76.1%). Food adaptation scores were significantly correlated with general characteristics (age, residence year, drinking alcohol and acquisition of nationality), total scores of eating behavior, and nutritional intake (energy, protein, fat, fiber, calcium, phosphorus, sodium, potassium, niacin, vitamin E, and zinc). These results might suggest that the better their Korean food adaptation, the more desirable their eating behavior and nutritional status.

Keywords: female immigrants, food adaptation, nutritional intake, multicultural family

Figures and Tables

Table 1

General characteristics of the subjects

1) Mean ± SD 2) N (%)

Table 2

Dietary life adaptation and dietary behavior of the subjects

1) Mean ± SD 2) Reverse coding

^*: p < 0.05, ^**: p < 0.01, ^***: p < 0.001

Table 3

Food intakes of the subjects

1) Mean ± SD

^*: p < 0.05

Table 4

Nutrient intakes of the subjects

1) Values are Mean ± SD 2) Intake adjusted for 1,000 kcal of energy intake

^*: p < 0.05

Table 5

Assessment of nutrient intakes: Proportion below the EAR

1) N (%)

Table 6

Correlation coefficients between dietary life adaptation and general characteristics, dietary behavior total scores, nutrient intake, food intakes

1) Coded: 0 = Non acquisition of Korean Nationality, 1 = Acquisition of Korean Nationality 2) Coded: 0 = Non alcohol drinking, 1 = Alcohol drinking

^*: p < 0.05, ^**: p < 0.01, ^***: p < 0.001 by pearson's correlation

Notes

This research was supported by Basic Science Research Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) funded by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (2011-0011486).

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