During pregnancy, mothers are often advised to make specific changes to their diet and lifestyle for optimal development of the foetus, whereas partners don't receive any diet or lifestyle recommendations. There is some evidence to suggest that diet and lifestyle behaviours of pregnant women are associated with those of their partners. This research will explore the dietary changes made by partner's during pregnancy, the associations between these changes with partners' sociodemographic and lifestyle behaviour characteristics and changes in maternal diet during pregnancy. The variables of maternal diet will include the ones assessing changes in diet during pregnancy and the scoring/ranking of mothers during pregnancy in the 4 different dietary patterns derived in previous work (1). This research will be based on the questions asked to partners and mothers in the antenatal data collection wave in the Growing Up in New Zealand cohort study. Data will be analyzed using descriptive statistics and univariate and multivariate logistic regression models.

Anticipated Outputs: This research project will determine whether changes and what type of changes are commonly made to diets of partners during women's pregnancy. This information is currently unknown for the NZ population.

References:

1. Wall CR, Gammon CS, Bandara DK, Grant CC, Atatoa Carr PE, Morton S. Dietary patterns in pregnancy in New Zealand—Influence of maternal socio-demographic, health and lifestyle factors. Nutrients. 2016 May;8(5):300.