Family Matters Intervention

STUDY INCLUSION CRITERIA The inclusionary criteria used to select participants for the proposed study includes: 1. Boys and girls (n=500) ages 5-10 years old who attend a primary care clinic (e.g., pediatrics, family medicine) in Minneapolis or St. Paul metro area, Minnesota or Denver metro area, Colorado and their primary caregiver (e.g., mother, father, grandparent) and any other family members (e.g., sibling, cousin). 2. Must eat ≤3 family dinner meals per week. Research shows that youth who have more than three family meals per week are less likely to be obese/high risk for cardiovascular disease ten years later. Thus, families who report three or fewer family meals per week will be recruited to optimize the potential for change in family meal frequency. Families will focus on the family dinner in the intervention to improve their family meal quality and quantity. This decision is based on: (1) Family Systems Theory, which indicates that change in one setting (e.g., family dinner) will generalize to other settings (e.g., breakfast, lunch, snacks). 3. Child with age and sex adjusted BMI ≥75th percentile (no upper limit). 4. One of the following race/ethnicities: African American, Asian, Hispanic/Latino, Native American, Asian American, or White. In order to examine racial/ethnic differences in study hypotheses, equal numbers of children per racial/ethnic group (total=500) will be recruited. 5. Parent and family members who speak English or Spanish. 6. Not expected to move within the next two years. STUDY EXCLUSION CRITERIA The exclusionary criteria used to exclude participants from the proposed study includes: 1. Children with medically necessary dietary restrictions. 2. Non-custodial parents, who the child does not live with more than 50% of the time.