The diversity of foods we eat has significantly increased since industrialization, but the amount of nutritionally essential vitamins and minerals we get from them has decreased.[1] In rich countries, diets are often composed of processed foods, and of highly refined grains, salt, sugar and fats. These foods can cause obesity and chronic diseases, such as heart disease and cancer.[2]
Other ways in which a diet could be nutritionally unbalanced include:
Cutting out fruit from the diet, and therefore reducing dietary fiber intake.
A high amount of total fat, usually coming from saturated fats.
Consuming very few vegetables.
Drinking an excessive amount of sugary drinks.
Consuming too many foods high in salt or too little food containing essential minerals and vitamins.
Early to mid-eighteenth century, some of the first modern surveys of diet and health included questions on alcohol intake. These surveys, such as the Townsend Inquiry into Diet and Health,[6] showed a strong correlation between excessive alcohol consumption and poor health, mortality, and poor education. In 1751, Sir James Porter, a judge in the Court of King's Bench, published a book that was based on inquiries he made to families about their diet and health, and found that "many are extremely drunken."[7] In the late 1800s, the first national nutritional surveys began to appear in Europe and the United States. These surveys determined that the typical American diet was poor and the United States was suffering from the disease of rickets, which was caused by a lack of vitamin D.[8]
Modern dietary surveys began to adopt food frequency questionnaires (FFQs) that measured a single portion of food with frequency categories, asking about the usual consumption of that food. The food frequency method of dietary assessment remains the most commonly used method today. Other methods include the single 24-hour recall method, multiple-day food records, and 24-hour urinary or salivary analysis. These methods are considered less accurate for measuring short-term intake.[9] An example of this is weight gain and weight loss. A person might report on their weight after a year of gain, but not notice the corresponding weight loss if they went on a diet in the interim. Conversely, a person might be aware of an extra ten pounds of weight loss, but not notice the corresponding weight gain after returning to their regular diet.
FFQs were used in the first two large-scale American national nutrition surveys, the
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