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Moffat Tina, Associate Professor

photo of Tina Moffat

Tina Moffat

Associate Professor

Faculty
Department of Anthropology

Area(s) of Interest:

Biography

Research & Supervisory Interests


My area of interest is nutrition and food insecurity as it relates to the social, cultural, and physical environment.   My research perspectives are grounded in biocultural and political-economic approaches.  My main geographic areas of focus are Canada and South Asia.

I am currently working with the YWCA to research and assess their Good Beginnings program, a volunteer support program for people at risk or experiencing post-partum depression. I have been actively involved in knowledge translation and support for pregnant women regarding the Developmental Origins of Health and Disease (DOHaD) as it relates to maternal diet and child health outcomes.  This is a community study based in Hamilton called "Mothers to Babies" (M2B).  In 2019-2020 I held a SSHRC Research Engage Grant (2019-2020) to do research and evaluation of youth food programming at the Hamilton Community Food Centre (HCFC), part of a growing movement of Food Centres across Canada that move beyond charity models of food banks to support food insecure populations to access nutritious food in a dignified manner. Recent research includes a study of food security and dietary change among immigrants and refugees in Canada, based on a CIHR-funded research project called Changing Homes, Changing Food (2012-2015).  Other research interests are vitamin D intake in North America, as well as the social and cultural determinants of child obesity.

Dr. Moffat will be on research leave in 2022-2023 and will not be accepting graduate students for entry into the program in September 2022.

 

Dr. Moffat invites you to join her for a virtual meeting. Please book an appointment with this Calendly app and she’ll send you a zoom link.

 

 

Education

BSc, University of Toronto, 1985 MA, McMaster, 1990

 

Teaching

Search course offerings in Anthropology

 

Courses (2022 - 2023)

Fall:

  • On Research Leave

Winter:

  • On Research Leave

 

Courses (2021 - 2022)

Fall:

  • ANTHROP 2AN3 - Anthropology of Food and Nutrition
  • ANTHROP 717 - Readings: Anthropology of Health

Winter:

  •  ANTHROP 740 - Biocultural Synthesis

 

 

 

Research

Publications

*** - undergraduate when submitted; ** - graduate when submitted; * - alum when submitted

Moffat, Tina. 2022 Small Bites: Biocultural Dimension of Children's Food and Nutrition.  230 pages. UBC Press.

**Elshahat, S., Moffat, T. (2021) Mental Health Triggers and Protective Factors Among Arabic-Speaking Immigrants and Refugees in North America: A Scoping Review. Journal of Immigrant Minority Healthhttps://doi.org/10.1007/s10903-021-01215-6.

Moffat, T., *McKerracher, L., Oresnik, S., Atkinson, S.A., Barker, M., McDonald, S.D., Murray-Davis, B., Sloboda, D.M. (2021) Investigating the normalization and normative views of gestational weight gain: Balancing recommendations with the promotion and support of healthy pregnancy diets. American Journal of Human Biology 33(5): e23604.https://doi.org/10.1002/ajhb.23604.

**Duignan, S., Moffat, T. & Martin-Hill, D. (2020). Using Boundary Objects to Co-Create Community Health and Water Knowledge with Community-Based Medical Anthropology and Indigenous Knowledge. Engaged Scholar Journal, 6 (1): 49–76. https://doi.org/10.15402/esj.v6i1.68178

**Elshahat, S. and Moffat, T. (2020). Dietary practices among Arabic-speaking immigrants and refugees in Western societies: A scoping review. Appetite 154(1):  104753.  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.appet.2020.104753

McKerracher, L., **Oresnik, S., Moffat, T., Murray-Davis, B., Vickers-Manzin, J., L. Zalot, ***Williams, Sloboda, D.M., and Barker, M.E. (2020). Addressing embodied inequities in health: how do we enable improvement in women’s diet in pregnancy?  Public Health Nutrition : 1-11.  https://doi.org/10.1111/mcn.12891 

McKerracher, L, Moffat, T., Barker, M., McConnell, M., Atkinson, S.A., Murray-Davis, B., MacDonald, S.D., and Sloboda, D.M. (2019) Knowledge about the Developmental Origins of Health and Disease is independently associated with variation in diet quality during pregnancy.  Maternal and Child Nutrition https://doi.org/10.1111/mcn.12891

Moffat, T. and  *Gendron, D. (2018) Cooking up the “gastro-citizen” through school meal programs in France and Japan.  Food, Culture & Society 22(1): 63-77.

McKerracher L, Moffat T, Barker M, ***Williams D, Sloboda DM. (2018) Translating the Developmental Origins of Health and Disease concept to improve the nutritional environment for our next generations: a call for a reflexive, positive, multi-level approach. Journal of Developmental Origins of Health and Disease pages 1 of 9. doi: 10.1017/S2040174418001034

Moffat T. and Prowse TL. (2018) Chapter 3. Biocultural and bioarchaeological approaches to infant and young child feeding in the past. In P Beauchesne and S Agarwal (eds.), Children and Childhood in the Past. University of Florida Press, pp. 98-126.

Moffat, T., *Mohammed, C., Newbold, K.B. (2017) Cultural dimensions of food security among immigrants and refugees.  Human Organization 76(1): 15-27.

*(Holland, A. and Moffat, T. (2017) Comparing measured calcium and vitamin D intakes with perceptions of intake in Canadian young adults: insights for designing osteoporosis prevention education. Public Health Nutrition 20(10): 1760-1767.

Moffat, T. and *Thrasher, D. (2016) School meal programs and their potential to operate as school-based obesity prevention and nutrition interventions: case studies from France and Japan. Critical Public Health 26(2): 133-146.

Brickley, M.B., Moffat, T., **Watamaniuk, L. (2014) Biocultural perspectives of vitamin D deficiency in the past. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology36: 48-59.

Moffat, T., Sellen, D., Wilson, W., Amarra, S., Anderson, L., and **Chadwick, S. (2014) Knowledge and Practice: Infant Vitamin D Supplementation among Canadian-born, Immigrant, and Refugee mothers. Journal of Transcultural Nursing 25(4): 321-322.

*Galloway, T. and Moffat T. (2013). "Not neutral ground": Exploring school as a site for childhood obesity intervention and prevention programs. Anthropology of Food and Nutrition Series: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Obesity Research, McCullough M, Harding J (eds), 34 pages. New York: Berghahn Press.

Moffat, T. and Prowse, T. (eds). (2010) Human Diet and Nutrition in Biocultural Perspective. Past Meets Present. Biosocial Book Series, Catherine Panter-Brick (ed.). Berghahn Press (Oxford and New York).

Moffat, T. (2010) The "Childhood obesity epidemic": Health crisis or social construction? Medical Anthropology Quarterly 24(1): 1-21.

Moffat, T. and *Galloway, T. (2008) Food consumption patterns among elementary school children in Hamilton, Ontario.  Short Report for Canadian Journal of Dietetic Practice and Research 69(3):152-154.

***Chaimovitz, R. Issenman, R., and Moffat, T. (2008) Body Perception: Do parents, their children and their children's physicians perceive body image differently?  Journal of Pediatric Gastroenterology and Nutrition, 47(1):76-80.

Moffat, T. and **Galloway, T. (2007) Adverse environments: investigating local variation in child growth.  American Journal of Human Biology, 19(5): 676-683.

**Latham, J. and Moffat, T. (2007) Determinants of variation in food cost and availability in two socioeconomically contrasting neighbourhoods in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.  Health and Place 13: 273-287.

Moffat, T., **Galloway, T. **Latham, J. (2005)  Stature and adiposity among children in contrasting neighbourhoods in the City of Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. American Journal of Human Biology. 17(3):355-367.

Moffat, T. and *Finnis, E. (2005)  Considering social and material resources: The political ecology of a peri-urban squatter community in Nepal. Habit International. 29(3):453-468.

Law, M. Wilson, K., Eyles, J., Elliott, S., Jerrett, M., Moffat, T., Luginaah, I. (2005) Local-level variations in unmet need and access to health care services in Hamilton, Ontario.  Health and Place 11: 366-367.

Moffat, T. (2004) Diarrhea, respiratory infections, protozoan gastrointestinal parasites, and child growth in Kathmandu, Nepal. American Journal of Physical Anthropology. 122(1):85-97.

Moffat, T. (2002)  Breastfeeding, wage labor and insufficient milk in peri-urban Kathmandu, Nepal. Medical Anthropology, 21(2):207-230.

Moffat, T. (2001) Growth stunting among children, aged birth to five years, in peri-urban Kathmandu, Nepal.  In: P. Dasgupta and R. Hauspie (eds.)  Perspectives in Human Growth, Development and Maturation.  Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, pp. 251-269.

Moffat, T. (2001) The weaning process as a biocultural practice: A case study of peri-urban mothers and infants in Nepal.  Journal of Biosocial Science 33:321-338.

Moffat, T. (2000)  Parents’ estimation of their children’s body size compared to classification of children’s nutritional status using the international growth reference. Ecology of Food and Nutrition. 39:311-329.

Moffat, T. and Herring A. (1999) The historical roots of high rates of infant death in Aboriginal communities in Canada in the early twentieth century: The Case of Fisher River, Manitoba.  Social Science and Medicine 48: 1821-1832.