Food Deserts

Abstract

Food deserts and accessibility represent a new frontier in the assault of life-threatening, dietrelated diseases, including diabetes, obesity, hypertension, and atherosclerosis. Scholars represent the research literature from diverse disciplines, such as anthropology, agriculture, sociology, economics, marketing, public policy, sociology, and social epidemiology. Applied sociology has not contributed to this important conversation. Applied sociology's integration and use of theory, methods, and practical approach for addressing social problems may enhance the food deserts and accessibility literature and help eradicate barriers to consumption of affordably priced and nutritious foods often associated with race/ethnicity, poverty, residential segregation, and lack of access. Medical research has long suggested that the onset of coronary disease, diabetes, hypertension, and obesity are exacerbated by poor nutritional habits and lack of exercise. These explanations are overly simplistic. Over the last twenty years a stream of research has begun to flow that explores how access (or lack of access) to food environments, including supermarket, grocery store, and food retail establishments, impacts food shopping habits and, thus, nutritional habits. We discuss some of the limitations associated with the food deserts and accessibility literature, including conceptual issues, the urban bias in research, methodological limitations, and the absence of theory.