ABSTRACT

Professionals such as social workers, public health officials, cultural networkers, researchers, and community leaders, who are designing and implementing programs and policies, can look to youth to gain a unique perspective on promoting community health. Across the United States, many communities experience inadequate access to nutritious foods that exacerbate poor health outcomes for marginalized populations – people of color, older or disabled adults, and those with lower education or income. To address food access disparities, providing youth voice and building youth empowerment may offer creative strategies to encourage community change. The Youth CAN (Change.Activity.Nutrition) project aimed to engage and empower adolescents to become agents of change for health within their community. Youth became active researchers through participatory action research (PAR) using socially engaged art platforms such as photovoice (photography), street art (graffiti-style art), and spoken word (poetry) to explore their environment and identify facilitators and barriers to healthy eating within their community. The World Café activity facilitated conversation among youth and adults to generate ideas to improve community food access. Collaboration between adult and youth researchers, and community leaders led to proposed solutions for improving access to healthy foods within an urban, low-income neighborhood. The Youth CAN project demonstrated how engaging and empowering youth through PAR is fundamental in promoting positive youth development and enabling youth to become advocates for equitable food access in their communities.

摘要

社会工作者、公共卫生官员、文化网络工作者、研究人员和社区领袖等专业人士正在设计和实施计划和政策，他们可以期待青年获得促进社区健康的独特视角。在美国各地，许多社区无法获得营养食品，这加剧了边缘化人群（有色人种、老年人或残疾人以及教育或收入较低的人群）的不良健康状况。为了解决食物获取差异，提供青年发言权和增强青年权能可能会提供鼓励社区变革的创造性策略。Youth CAN (Change.Activity.Nutrition) 项目旨在让青少年参与并赋予他们能力，使其成为社区内健康变革的推动者。青年通过参与式行动研究 (PAR) 成为活跃的研究人员，他们使用摄影之声（摄影）、街头艺术（涂鸦风格艺术）和口语（诗歌）等社会参与艺术平台来探索他们的环境并确定健康饮食的促进因素和障碍在他们的社区内。World Café 活动促进了青年和成年人之间的对话，以产生改善社区食物获取的想法。成人和青年研究人员以及社区领袖之间的合作导致提出了改善城市低收入社区获得健康食品的解决方案。青年 CAN 项目展示了通过 PAR 让青年参与和赋权对于促进积极的青年发展和使青年成为社区中公平获取食物的倡导者至关重要。