Adolescent Nutrition: Measurement Brief

Characterized by rapid growth, brain development and physical maturation, adolescence is a period of high nutritional needs (Das, 2017). During this phase, adolescents also increasingly make food choices independent of their parents, often exhibiting a preference for highly processed or sugary foods (Fleming, et al., 2020). Their food choices are driven not only by taste, but also location, financial considerations, food insecurity, their food environment, peers, and gender (Fleming, et al., 2020). This makes it a period of vulnerability, but also an opportunity to correct nutritional deficits from earlier life, establish healthy habits as they approach adulthood and prepare for parenthood.

The links between maternal nutritional status and newborn and child health outcomes are well documented and many examples of nutrition services for older adolescent girls aim to improve birth outcomes and newborn health. However, good nutrition is also associated with improved outcomes for adolescents themselves (both boys and girls), such as improved cognition, learning, productivity and reduced morbidity.

Currently, adolescents—those aged 10-19 years—make up 16% of the world’s population, yet little attention is paid to this important demographic and their nutrition. For example, the only World Health Assembly Nutrition target that includes any adolescents is the target to reduce anemia by 50% among women of reproductive age, which includes girls aged 15-19 years as a subset, though the target is not explicitly disaggregated by age groups. Other targets address nutrition among newborns, young children or pre-school aged children (WHO, 2014), but not adolescents. Similarly, adolescents are often overlooked in national and subnational policy making, target setting, and program implementation (UNICEF, 2022).

Little is known globally about adolescents’ nutritional status, their access to nutritional services or their dietary habits. For example, only 28 countries have national level data that would allow assessment of adolescent nutrient intake and many of these are high income countries (Neufeld, et al., 2021). The purpose of this brief is to present current challenges and share approaches to strengthen measurement of adolescent nutrition.