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Kimberly B. Morland, PhD, Steven B. Wing, PhD and Ana V. Diez Roux, MD, PhD

Kimberly B Morland is with the Dept of Community and Preventive Medicine, Mount Sinai School of Medicine. Steven B. Wing is with the Dept of Epidemiology, University of North Carolina School of Public Health, Chapel Hill. Ana V. Diez Roux is with the Division of General Medicine, College of Physicians and Surgeons and the Dept of Epidemiology, Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University, New York, NY.

Correspondence: Requests for reprints should be sent to Kimberly B. Morland, PhD, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, Department of Community and Preventive Medicine, One Gustave Levy Place, Box 1057, New York, NY 10029-6574 (e mail: kimberly.morland{at}mssm.edu).

We are encouraged that other researchers have been investigating the health impacts associated with the availability of food stores. It is unfortunate, although not surprising, that the absence of commercial food institutions in low-income, minority neighborhoods is an international concern. Documenting the structural effects of racial segregation on the well-being of residents is paramount in determining the extent to which racial isolation of Black Americans over the past decades constrains individual change. Understanding the mechanisms involved in dietary choices requires theory and analysis that address the interactions of cultural factors, food costs, individual income and education, dietary habits, and availability of foods. Factors influencing diet, from agriculture to advertising, from the local food environment to choices at the shelf, are historical, not fixed.

Certainly, further quantitative research is needed to better understand the ways in which environmental contexts affect health, and the approaches Cummins suggests will be key in this regard. However, at a time when expanding economic inequalities and residential segregation threaten to further degrade the "foodscape" of low-income, minority communities, there are already strong theoretical and empirical grounds to expect that food environments offering both affordable and healthy choices are increasingly critical to these communities.

This Article Extract Full Text (PDF) Submit a response Purchase Article View Shopping Cart Alert me when this article is cited Alert me when eLetters are posted Alert me if a correction is posted Services Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Citing Articles Citing Articles via ISI Web of Science (1) Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Morland, K. B. Articles by Diez Roux, A. V. Search for Related Content PubMed Articles by Morland, K. B. Articles by Diez Roux, A. V. Related Collections Community Health Nutrition/Food Urban Health