ArticleInternational journal of epidemiology2017
Does unmeasured confounding influence associations between the retail food environment and body mass index over time? The Coronary Artery Risk Development in Young Adults (CARDIA) study.
Article in International journal of epidemiology, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 16 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
16 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- The impact of the consumer and neighbourhood food environment on dietary intake and obesity-related outcomes: A systematic review of causal impact studies.Social science & medicine (1982) · 2022Pooled it
- Measurement tools to assess the obesogenic environment in neighborhood: a scoping review.BMC public health · 2025Article
- Article
- Impact of Food Environments on Obesity Rates: A State-Level Analysis.Journal of obesity · 2023Article
- Neighborhood Socioeconomic Environment and Risk of Type 2 Diabetes: Associations and Mediation Through Food Environment Pathways in Three Independent Study Samples.Diabetes care · 2022Article
- An Indicator Measuring the Influence of the Online Public Food Environment: An Analytical Framework and Case Study.Frontiers in nutrition · 2022Article
- Associations between online food outlet access and online food delivery service use amongst adults in the UK: a cross-sectional analysis of linked data.BMC public health · 2021Article
- Ultra-processed food consumption patterns among older adults in the Netherlands and the role of the food environment.European journal of nutrition · 2021Article
- Assessing county-level determinants of diabetes in the United States (2003-2012).Health & place · 2020Article
- Neighbourhood effects on obesity: scoping review of time-varying outcomes and exposures in longitudinal designs.BMJ open · 2020Article
- Comparing Different Residential Neighborhood Definitions and the Association Between Density of Restaurants and Home Cooking Among Dutch Adults.Nutrients · 2019Article
- The Moderating Role of Self-Control and Financial Strain in the Relation between Exposure to the Food Environment and Obesity: The GLOBE Study.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2019Article
- Associations of Unhealthy Food Environment With the Development of Coronary Artery Calcification: The CARDIA Study.Journal of the American Heart Association · 2019Article
- Differences in the Neighborhood Retail Food Environment and Obesity Among US Children and Adolescents by SNAP Participation.Obesity (Silver Spring, Md.) · 2018Article
- Is adolescent body mass index and waist circumference associated with the food environments surrounding schools and homes? A longitudinal analysis.BMC public health · 2018Article
- Food Swamps Predict Obesity Rates Better Than Food Deserts in the United States.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2017Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
8 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Background: Findings in the observational retail food environment and obesity literature are inconsistent, potentially due to a lack of adjustment for residual confounding. Methods: Using data from the CARDIA study (n = 12 174 person-observations; 6 examinations; 1985-2011) across four US cities (Birmingham, AL; Chicago, IL; Minneapolis, MN; Oakland, CA), we used instrumental-variables (IV) regression to obtain causal estimates of the longitudinal associations between the percentage of neighbourhood food stores or restaurants (per total food outlets within 1 km network distance of respondent residence) with body mass index (BMI), adjusting for individual-level socio-demographics, health behaviours, city, year, total food outlets and market-level prices. To determine the presence and extent of bias, we compared the magnitude and direction of results with ordinary least squares (OLS) and random effects (RE) regression, which do not control for residual confounding, and with fixed effects (FE) regression, which does not control for time-varying residual confounding. Results: Relative to neighbourhood supermarkets (which tend to be larger and have healthier options than grocery stores), a higher percentage of grocery stores [mean = 53.4%; standard deviation (SD) = 31.8%] was positively associated with BMI [β = 0.05; 95% confidence interval (CI) = 0.01, 0.10] using IV regression. However, associations were negligible or null using OLS (β = -0.001; 95% CI = -0.01, 0.01), RE (β = -0.003; 95% CI = -0.01, 0.0001) and FE (β = -0.003; 95% CI = -0.01, 0.0002) regression. Neighbourhood convenience stores and fast-food restaurants were not associated with BMI in any model. Conclusions: Longitudinal associations between neighbourhood food outlets and BMI were greater in magnitude using a causal model, suggesting that weak findings in the literature may be due to residual confounding.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.