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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2023 Jul 1.
Published in final edited form as: Appetite. 2022 Mar 22;174:106009. doi: 10.1016/j.appet.2022.106009

Table 4.

Simply Dinner Screening Phase Outcome Measures for the Intervention Combinations that Included Cooking/Serving Resources + Meal Delivery (n=65)

Measure and Response Scale Pre-Intervention Measure Mean (SD) Post-Intervention Measure Mean (SD) Effect Size Cohen’s d Paired t-test P-Value
Primary Outcomes
Family Meal Frequency
Parent and Child Eating Together (0–7 d/wk) 5.14 (2.46) 5.53 (1.92) 0.17 0.21

Proxy Indicators of Dietary Quality
Daily fruit servings 1.44 (0.82) 1.54 (0.95) 0.12 0.52
Daily vegetable servings 0.51 (0.37) 0.54 (0.37) 0.07 0.37
Daily saturated fat (g) 17.19 (8.29) 17.60 (7.96) 0.05 0.94
Daily potato servings, include French fries 0.24 (0.14) 0.25 (0.17) 0.05 0.54
Daily sugar-sweetened beverage servings 0.13 (0.21) 0.10 (0.21) −0.12 0.48
Fruits + Vegetables combined 1.94 (1.00) 2.08 (1.16) 0.12 0.38
Fruits + Vegetables + Legumes combined 1.98 (1.01) 2.12 (1.17) 0.13 0.35
Whole grains 0.61 (0.53) 0.61 (0.52) −0.01 0.76

Secondary Outcomes
Meal Preparation Type
Frequency of making dinner mostly “from scratch” (0–7 d/wk) 3.97 (1.80) 4.33 (1.67) 0.21 0.14
Frequency of making dinner using only ready-made foods (0–7 d/wk) 2.40 (2.05) 2.05 (1.74) −0.18 0.15
Frequency of fast-food consumption for evening meal (0–7 d/wk) 1.30 (1.34) 1.02 (1.13) −0.23 0.08

Perceptions of Barriers to Mealtimes
Time scarcity relative to meal planning (1 [low] to 5 [high]) 2.51 (1.75) 2.57 (1.51) 0.03 0.98
Time scarcity relative to meal preparation (1 [low] to 5 [high]) 2.18 (0.95) 2.14 (0.91) −0.05 0.74
Priority for Family Meals (1 [low] to 4 [high]) 3.16 (0.54) 3.28 (0.57) 0.23 0.31

Family Functioning
Parenting distress sum (higher scores reflect greater distress) (possible range 12 – 72) 26.00 (7.77) 25.73 (8.95) −0.03 0.49
Family functioning (lower scores reflect more optimal family functioning) (1 [more optimal] to 4 [less optimal]) 1.68 (0.44) 1.52 (0.43) −0.37 0.007

Availability of Kitchen/Food Preparation Supplies
Number of basic cooking utensils (possible range from 0 to 12) 8.63 (2.39) 9.67 (2.05) 0.46 0.0009
Number of basic cookware items (possible range from 0 to 8) 5.56 (1.34) 6.15 (1.19) 0.47 0.0004