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Background: Understanding how vegetables are incorporated into the diet, especially in the types and amounts recommended by the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, and how this alters dietary intake patterns is vital for developing targeted behavior change interventions., Objective: To determine how a provision of vegetables was incorporated into the diet of adults with overweight and obesity; whether or not the provided vegetables displaced other foods; and what, if any, effect this had on diet quality and body weight and composition., Design: This study investigated secondary outcomes from the Motivating Value of Vegetables Study, a community-based, randomized, parallel, nonblinded controlled trial. Participants were randomly assigned to a provided vegetable intervention or attention control group using a one to one allocation ratio., Participants/setting: Men and women with self-reported low vegetable consumption, aged 18 to 65 years, with a body mass index ≥25 were recruited from Grand Forks, ND, between October 2015 and September 2017. Only participants randomized to the provided vegetable intervention group (n = 51; attrition = 8%) were included in this secondary analysis., Intervention: Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommended types and amounts of vegetables were provided weekly for 8 weeks., Main Outcome Measures: How the provided vegetables were incorporated into the diet was measured using daily self-report and 24-hour dietary recalls. Diet quality was assessed via the Healthy Eating Index 2015. Body weight and composition were measured before and after the intervention., Statistical Analyses Performed: Data were assessed using generalized linear mixed models where phase (pre, post) was the within-subject factor and subject was the random effect., Results: Participants self-reported using 29% of the provided vegetables as substitutes for other foods. With the increase in vegetable consumption, there were decreases in total grains (mean difference ± standard deviation; -0.97 ± 3.23 oz-equivalents; P = 0.02), protein foods (-1.24 ± 3.86 oz-equivalents; P = 0.01), saturated fats (-6.44 ± 19.63 g; P = 0.02), and added sugars (-2.44 ± 6.78 tsp-equivalents; P = 0.02) consumed. Total Healthy Eating Index 2015 scores increased (+4.48 ± 9.63; P = 0.001) and dietary energy density decreased (-0.44 ± 0.52 kcal/g; P < 0.0001). There was no change in total energy intake or body weight and composition., Conclusions: Increasing vegetable consumption to meet Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommendations alters dietary intake patterns, improving diet quality and energy density. These findings highlight the importance of characterizing how individuals incorporate Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommendations into their diet., (Copyright © 2022 Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Background: The health benefits of diets rich in fruits and vegetables (FV) are well established. Recent observational and intervention research suggests that FV consumption may also exert a positive effect on psychological well-being., Objective: This study aimed to assess changes in mean Subjective Happiness Scale (SHS) scores in response to consuming 2010-2015 Dietary Guidelines for Americans (DGA) recommended types and amounts of vegetables. It was hypothesized that increased vegetable consumption would increase mean SHS scores., Design: This study investigated a secondary outcome of a randomized, parallel, nonblinded controlled trial with a 1:1 allocation ratio to a provided vegetable intervention or attention control group., Participants/setting: Men and women (n = 75) aged 18 to 65 years, body mass index ≥ 25, with low habitual vegetable consumption were recruited from Grand Forks, North Dakota, December 2016 to January 2018, for this community-based study., Intervention: The vegetable intervention consisted of an 8-week feeding phase during which participants were provided with vegetables in DGA-recommended types and amounts. The attention control group was not provided vegetables but completed the same testing schedule as the vegetable intervention group., Main Outcome Measure: Mean SHS scores were assessed before and after the intervention., Statistical Analyses: Mean SHS scores were analyzed using a 2-way factorial mixed linear model analysis of variance., Results: A significant interaction between treatment and visit (P = .015) revealed greater mean SHS scores at week 8 than at baseline in the vegetable intervention group (+0.23 ± 0.11) (mean difference ± SE of the difference) but no change in the attention control group (-0.15 ± 0.11)., Conclusions: Greater mean SHS scores were observed after increasing vegetable consumption to meet DGA recommendations, suggesting that adhering to DGA vegetable guidance may help promote psychological well-being., (Copyright © 2022 Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Background: Food reinforcement, or the motivation to obtain food, can predict choice and consumption. Vegetable consumption is well below recommended amounts for adults, so understanding how to increase vegetable reinforcement could provide valuable insight into how to increase consumption., Objectives: We sought to determine whether daily consumption of the Dietary Guidelines for Americans (DGA) recommendations for vegetable intake induces sensitization of vegetable reinforcement in adults with overweight and obesity., Methods: Healthy adults with a BMI ≥ 25 kg/m2 who consumed ≤1 cup-equivalent of vegetables/day were randomly assigned to a vegetable intervention (VI; n = 55) or an attention control (AC; n = 55) group. The VI consisted of the daily provision of vegetables in the amounts and types recommended by the DGA (∼270 g/day) for 8 weeks. Participants were followed for an additional 8 weeks to assess sustained consumption. Compliance was measured weekly by resonance Raman light-scattering spectroscopy (RRS). Vegetable reinforcement was tested at weeks 0, 8, 12, and 16 using a computer choice paradigm., Results: In the VI group, RRS intensity increased from week 0 to 8 (from 22,990 to 37,220), returning to baseline by week 16 (27,300). No change was observed in the AC group. There was no main effect of treatment (P = 0.974) or time (P = 0.14) and no treatment x time interaction (P = 0.44) on vegetable reinforcement. There was no moderating effect of sex (P = 0.07), age (P = 0.60), BMI (P = 0.46), delay discounting (P = 0.24), 6-n-propylthiouracil taster status (P = 0.15), or dietary disinhibition (P = 0.82) on the change in vegetable reinforcement., Conclusions: These findings suggest no effects of the provision of a variety of vegetables to meet DGA recommendations for 8 weeks on vegetable reinforcement and highlight the difficulty in increasing vegetable consumption in adults. This trial was registered at clinicaltrials.gov as NCT02585102., (Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Society for Nutrition 2021.)