Data & Research
The WIC Infant and Toddler Feeding Practices Study 2 (WIC ITFPS-2)/ “Feeding My Baby” Study captures data on caregivers and their children over the first 6 years of the child’s life after WIC enrollment to address a series of research questions regarding feeding practices, associations between WIC services and those practices, and the health and nutrition outcomes of children receiving WIC. To date, the study has produced three reports: the Intentions to Breastfeed Report (2015); the Infant Year Report (2017); and the Second Year Report (2018). The current report focuses on caregivers’ employment, school, and child care circumstances, as well as the feeding beliefs and practices, dietary intake, and weight status of children from birth through approximately 36 months of age.
To explore other options for assessing impacts, FNS awarded a contract to provide FNS with new information on: experiences and satisfaction of participants in FNS programs, and impacts of program participation on food security, diet quality, and other indicators of household well-being.
A summary of past research on program operations and outcomes related to the Food Stamp Program.
Most discussion of payment accuracy in the Food Stamp Program focuses on the overall level and cost of payment errors. Rarely does the discussion focus on the impact of payment errors on individual households affected. This analysis – based on 2003 food stamp quality control data – leads to two broad conclusions. First, virtually all households receiving food stamps are eligible. Thus, the problem of erroneous payments is not so much one of determining eligibility, but rather one of attempting to finely target benefits to the complicated and changing circumstances of low-income households. Second, most overpayments to eligible households are small relative to household income and official poverty standards. As a result, most food stamp households are poor, and they remain poor even when overpaid.
The national nutrition safety net consists of 15 programs that provide millions of low-income Americans access to a healthy and nutritious diet. It has been observed that many low-income individuals are both overweight and participants in one or more nutrition assistance programs. This has led some to question whether participation in the nutrition assistance programs contributes to the growing problem of overweight and obesity. This report presents the conclusions of an expert panel convened by the Food and Nutrition Service to determine if there is scientific evidence of a relationship between program participation and excess weight.
This is the final report for the project, "Analysis of the Current Population Survey Data for Food Security and Hunger Measurement" conducted by Mathematica Policy Research, Inc.
Over the last decade, food stamp participation rose more sharply than expected following the relatively short and mild recession in the early 1990s and fell more sharply than expected after 1994 during the sustained period of economic growth. Report language accompanying the Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act of 2001 directed the Food and Nutrition Service to study the decline in participation in the Food Stamp Program.