Abstract
The measurement of food insecurity is essential to monitor the prevalence, risk factors, consequences and effects of food insecurity and the interventions and policies implemented to tackle it. Yet, how best to apply it remains an unsettled issue due to the multifaceted and context-dependent nature of food insecurity. We report a scoping review of measures of food insecurity at the individual and household level in high-income countries with the final purpose of facilitating a catalogue of instruments to be used by both researchers and practitioners. The scoping review was conducted following the methodological framework of Arksey and O’Malley and the Joanna Briggs Institute guidelines. We included all types of documents published between 2000–2020 using instruments that estimate food insecurity at both individual and household level in high-income countries, and with respondents including adolescents, adults, and elderly. We identified a total of 23 measurement strategies being used in 33 peer-reviewed publications and 114 documents from the grey literature. Our results show that most measures focus on the access dimension of food insecurity and that further research is required to develop measures that incorporate aspects of quality of dietary intake and relevant individual, household and social conditions related to food insecurity.
Highlights
The 2020 edition of the Food and Agriculture Organization’s (FAO) yearly report “The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI)” showed that food insecurity was rising
We report a scoping review of measures of food insecurity at the individual and household level in high-income countries with the final purpose of facilitating a catalogue of instruments to be used by both researchers and practitioners
33 publications from the scientific literature were included (Figure 1), which comprised original articles (n = 26), literature reviews (n = 7), and the 114 documents from the grey literature. These 147 documents reported data on food insecurity at the household level and individual level in high-income countries using a total of 23 measurement strategies
Summary
The 2020 edition of the Food and Agriculture Organization’s (FAO) yearly report “The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI)” showed that food insecurity was rising. More localized analysis shows that prevalences of food insecurity in specific populations of these territories could be above 10–15% [3,4,5,6]. Food insecurity threatens both individuals and societies, and constitutes a serious threat to public health and wider society [7]. In children, it has been associated with impaired physical and psychological development, the effects of which can persist into adolescence and adulthood.
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