Fruit and Vegetable Accessibility in the Home: Intervention Changes and Cross-Sectional Associations with Diet Quality

Abstract

Background/Objectives: Fruit and vegetable (FV) availability/accessibility are associated with increased intake of FVs and are important determinants of intake. The aim of this analysis was to evaluate the pre-post changes in an FV accessibility intervention and examine cross-sectional associations between accessibility domains and diet quality categories at pre- and post-intervention. Methods: Thirty parent–child dyads (mean age = 41.2 ± 4.7; 9.2 ± 1.9) completed an 8-week pre-post intervention. Assessments included perceptions of accessibility, the Home Food Inventory with added accessibility domains, and three-day diet records used to calculate HEI-2020 scores. Stuart–Maxwell tests were used to evaluate changes in categorical responses, paired t-tests assessed pre-post changes, and independent t-tests compared accessibility by HEI category. Results: Parents reported a perceived increase in frequency of having the form of FVs prepared/ready for use (p = 0.034). No significant pre–post changes were observed in objective FV availability/accessibility domains, FV intake, or HEI scores for children and parents. Exploratory analyses showed that children and parents with HEI-total scores above national averages had higher mean FV location and visibility, with post-intervention visibility being significantly associated with higher HEI among children (p = 0.048) and location being significantly associated with higher HEI among parents at pre- (p = 0.033) and post-intervention (p = 0.046). Conclusions: The FV accessibility intervention did not significantly improve objective HFE accessibility or diet quality in this small sample. Exploratory findings suggest that FV accessibility domains may be associated with diet quality; however, these observations are preliminary. Larger and longer-term studies are needed to determine whether modifying FV accessibility can meaningfully improve children’s dietary intake.