Relationship between Food Insecurity and Mental Health: Does Enrollment in the Double Up Food Bucks Program Moderate this Relationship?

Abstract

Food insecurity affects mental health, making it a serious public health crisis in the US. The influence of dietary patterns on psychological well-being has been well-documented. The Double Up Food Bucks (DUFB) program incentivizes the purchase of fresh fruits and vegetables by low-income SNAP households. This study aims to investigate the relationship between food insecurity and psychological distress and determine whether DUFB enrollment moderates this relationship by leveraging primary cross-sectional dataset. The findings showed that food insecurity was significantly associated with psychological distress in the Alabama context. The enrollment in the DUFB program significantly moderated the association between food insecurity and psychological distress. This suggests that the DUFB enrollment attenuated the association between food insecurity and psychological distress. Future studies using the panel dataset and expanding to more states can provide better insights into the moderating effect of the DUFB enrollment on the association between food insecurity and psychological distress.