peer-reviewed article in JAMA Network Open<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\u201cPeople who were already eating more fruits and vegetables before the program increased their intake further, moving closer to recommended levels,\u201d said Alison Tovar, the lead author of the study and associate professor in Brown University\u2019s Department of Behavioral and Social Sciences. \u201cIn contrast, households with lower baseline intake showed little or no change.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Vadiveloo explained that there could be several reasons why there wasn\u2019t much, if any, intake increase among those who weren\u2019t eating fruits and vegetables before the program.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIndividuals with lower intake at baseline may have been more likely to experience disadvantages, such as fewer transportation options, which could result in less access to participating stores, and lower overall income to purchase groceries,\u201d said Vadiveloo. \u201cMultiple factors could have contributed to the difference in the results.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Prior to joining the faculty at Brown, Tovar was a faculty member in äçÐÄvlogÃâ·ÑBÕ¾\u2019s Department of Nutrition for 13 years. In conducting the study with Vadiveloo and other colleagues, Tovar noted that awareness of the Eat Well, Be Well program was low.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cOnly about one in three participants could correctly describe what Eat Well, Be Well provides, and only about one in four said they had used the discount,\u201d said Tovar. \u201cThat suggests the program design has potential, but implementation and communication are critical if we want to see population-wide improvements.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Besides being SNAP recipients and residents of Rhode Island or Connecticut, participants in the study had to be 18 years of age or older, English or Spanish speaking, and have access to email and a text-capable phone. The team collaborated with community partners to recruit participants. Most of the participants from each state were women\u201494% from Rhode Island and 96.4% from Connecticut.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The research team is currently analyzing data from a follow-up of the study, conducted 17-20 months after the initial research. Going forward, they will examine longer-term outcomes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe want to learn how these incentives affect entire households, including children, and we\u2019re using qualitative interviews to learn directly from participants and stakeholders about what would make the program more usable and sustainable in their daily lives,\u201d said Tovar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While it\u2019s not directly related to their study, Tovar said it\u2019s important to consider factors that may alter the results of incentive programs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cRising food costs and stagnant SNAP benefit updates shape how families experience and value these incentives,\u201d said Tovar. \u201cIf participants must shop at more expensive stores to access the discount, or if the incentive applies only to fresh produce, they may have to shift their shopping patterns in ways that make it harder to stretch benefits across the entire month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThese broader economic pressures influence how likely households are to use the program and how meaningful the savings feel in practice. Future implementation efforts need to account for these realities, ensuring that incentives are accessible through the stores where families already shop.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
KINGSTON, R.I. \u2013 Nov. 25, 2025 \u2013 When Eat Well, Be Well was launched in Rhode Island in January 2024, it was the first program of its kind in the country to offer a financial incentive for those in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) to eat healthier. All SNAP recipients were automatically enrolled in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":105494,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4,1905],"class_list":["post-105493","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archives","tag-college-of-health-sciences","tag-research"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105493","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/25"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=105493"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105493\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":105495,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105493\/revisions\/105495"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/105494"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=105493"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=105493"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=105493"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}