Dietary approaches to healthy weight management for adolescents: the New Moves model

Abstract

This article describes the dietary component of New Moves, a school-based obesity-prevention program for adolescent girls. New Moves is a multicomponent intervention that integrates nutrition, social support, and physical activity sessions within an all-girls physical education high school class. New Moves also includes individual counseling sessions that use motivational interviewing techniques, follow-up group lunch meetings, and parent outreach activities. The nutrition component focuses on avoiding dieting and unhealthy weight-control behaviors and adopting lifelong healthy eating behaviors such as increasing fruit and vegetable intake, decreasing sweetened beverage intake, eating breakfast daily, and paying attention to internal signs of hunger and satiety.

Figure 1. New Moves theoretical model of change based on Social Cognitive Theory

PA = physical activity

Figure 2. New Moves Behavioral Objectives

*Dietary objectives are bolded

Figure 3. Intervention schedule during the initial and maintenance phase of the study