Acculturation and Dietary Acculturation among Arab Muslim Immigrants in Canada

Publication: Canadian Journal of Dietetic Practice and Research
25 March 2019

Abstract

Purpose: The purpose of this work was to assess Arab Muslim immigrant mothers’ acculturation level, to explore apparent links between acculturation level and experiences of dietary changes, and to gather information on factors affecting dietary acculturation.
Methods: Semi-structured individual interviews focusing on food choices were conducted with 24 mothers who had been in Canada 5 years or more. An adapted version of an existing acculturation scale was used to assess participants’ perception of their own acculturation.
Results: Arab Muslim mothers retain traditional food preparation. However, several factors led to changes in their daily food consumption such as children’s preferences, time concerns, and availability of Arabic food. No significant relation was found between measured levels of acculturation and the adoption of Canadian food behaviour or the retention of preparation and consumption of traditional foods (dietary acculturation); however, a greater length of stay in Canada was somewhat associated with limitations on preparing traditional food. The findings indicated that many of the Arab Muslim mothers interviewed retain important aspects of their traditional cuisine.
Conclusions: Dietary acculturation for Arab Muslim immigrants to Canada involved a balance between carrying forward food-related traditions and adapting to Canadian culture, including Canada’s food culture.

Résumé

Objectif. L’objectif de ce travail était d’évaluer le niveau d’acculturation des mères immigrantes arabo-musulmanes, d’explorer les liens apparents entre le niveau d’acculturation et les expériences de changements de régime alimentaire, et de recueillir de l’information sur les facteurs qui influencent l’acculturation alimentaire.
Méthodes. Des entrevues individuelles semi-structurées axées sur les choix d’aliments ont été menées auprès de 24 mères vivant au Canada depuis au moins cinq ans. Une version adaptée d’une échelle d’acculturation actuelle a été utilisée pour évaluer la perception des participantes de leur propre acculturation.
Résultats. Les mères arabo-musulmanes continuent de préparer des aliments traditionnels. Cependant, plusieurs facteurs ont mené à des changements dans leur consommation quotidienne d’aliments, dont les préférences des enfants, le manque de temps et la disponibilité des aliments arabes. Aucune relation significative n’a été observée entre les niveaux d’acculturation mesurés et l’adoption de comportements alimentaires canadiens ou le maintien de la préparation et de la consommation d’aliments traditionnels (acculturation alimentaire); cependant, un séjour plus long au Canada a été associé dans une certaine mesure à des limitations quant à la préparation des aliments traditionnels. Les conclusions indiquent que plusieurs des mères arabo-musulmanes interrogées conservent des aspects importants de leur cuisine traditionnelle.
Conclusions. L’acculturation alimentaire des immigrants arabo-musulmans au Canada repose sur un équilibre entre la transmission des traditions alimentaires et l’adaptation à la culture canadienne, dont la culture alimentaire.

Get full access to this article

View all available purchase options and get full access to this article.

Funding source: This research was funding by The Ministry of Education in Saudi Arabia under the scholarship of King Salman bin Abdul Aziz. The funder had no role in study design, collection, analysis and interpretation of data, writing of the article or the decision to submit the article for publication.
Conflicts of interest: The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

References

1
Lindsay C. The arab community in Canada. Ottawa, ON: Statistics Canada Catalogue no. 89-621-X1E; 2001 [cited 2018 May 2]. Available from: http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/89-621-x/89-621-x2007009-eng.htm#footnote1.
2
Statistics Canada. Immigration and ethnocultural diversity in Canada. Ottawa, ON: Statistics Canada Catalogue no. 99-010-X201100; 2001 [cited 2018 Oct 22]. Available from: https://www12.statcan.gc.ca/nhs-enm/2011/as-sa/99-010-x/99-010-x2011001-eng.cfm.
3
Statistics Canada. Census Profile, 2016 Census. Ottawa, ON: Statistics Canada Catalogue no. 98-316-X2016001; 2017 [cited 2018 Nov 3]. Available from: https://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2016/dp-pd/prof/details/page.cfm?Lang=E&Geo1=PR&Code1=01&Geo2=PR&Code2=01&Data=Count&SearchText=Canada& SearchType=Begins&SearchPR=01&B1=Visible%20minority&TABID=1&.
4
Berry JW and Sam DL. Acculturation and adaptation. Handb. Cross-Cult Psychol. 1997;3(2):291–326.
5
Berry JW. Conceptual approaches to acculturation. In: Chun KM, Balls Organista P, Marín G, editors. Acculturation: advances in theory, measurement, and applied research. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association; 2003. pp. 17–37.
6
Satia-Abouta J, Patterson RE, Neuhouser ML, and Elder J. Dietary acculturation: applications to nutrition research and dietetics. J Am Diet Assoc. 2002;102(8):1105–118.
7
Satia-Abouta J. Dietary acculturation: definition, process, assessment, and implications. Int J Hum Ecol. 2003;4(1):71–86.
8
Satia JA, Patterson RE, Taylor VM, Cheney CL, Shiu-Thornton S, Chitnarong K, et al. Use of qualitative methods to study diet, acculturation, and health in Chinese-American women. J Am Diet Assoc. 2000;100(8):934–40.
9
Birch L, Savage JS, and Ventura A. Influences on the development of children’s eating behaviours: from infancy to adolescence. Can J Diet Pract Res. 2007;68(1):s1–s56.
10
Scaglioni S, Arrizza C, Vecchi F, and Tedeschi S. Determinants of children’s eating behavior. Am J Clin Nutr. 2011;94(Suppl 6):2006S–2011S.
11
Van Hook J and Baker E. Big boys and little girls: gender, acculturation, and weight among young children of immigrants. J Health Soc Behav. 2010;51(2):200–214.
12
Tami SH, Reed DB, Boylan M, and Zvonkovic A. Assessment of the effect of acculturation on dietary and physical activity behaviors of Arab mothers in Lubbock, Texas. Ethn Dis. 2012;22(2):192–97.
13
Blanchet R, Sanou D, Batal M, Nana CP, and Giroux ID. Draw and tell: dietary acculturation as lived by black immigrant children of African and Caribbean descent residing in Canada. J Nutr Educ Behav. 2017;49(10):838–846.e1.
14
Odermatt A. The Western-style diet: a major risk factor for impaired kidney function and chronic kidney disease. Am J Physiol Renal Physiol. 2011;301(5):F919–31.
15
Leedy PD. Practical research: planning and design. 7th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Merrill Prentice Hall; 2001.
16
Williams C. Research methods. J Bus Econ Res. 2011;5(3).
17
Vallianatos H and Raine K. Consuming food and constructing identities among Arabic and South Asian immigrant women. Food, Cult Soc. 2008;11(3):355–73.
18
Al-Jayyousi GF, Roy RN, and Al-Salim F. Muslim mothering and migration. Int J Educ Soc Sci. 2014;1(4):41–49.
19
Maiter S and George U. Understanding context and culture in the parenting approaches of immigrant south Asian mothers. Affilia. 2003;18(4):411–28.
20
Denzin NK, Lincoln YS. Handbook of qualitative research. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage; 1994.
21
Kuzel AJ. Sampling in qualitative inquiry. In: Crabtree BF, Miles WL, editors. Doing qualitative research. 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage; 1999. pp. 33–45.
22
Morse JM. Determining sample size. Qual Health Res. 2000;10(1):3–5.
23
Mason M. Sample size and saturation in PhD studies using qualitative interviews. Forum: Qual Res / Sozialforschung, 2010;11(3).
24
Marshall B, Cardon P, Poddar A, and Fontenot R. Does sample size matter in qualitative research? A review of qualitative interviews in IS research. J Comput Info Syst. 2013;54(1):11–22.
25
Barry DT. Measuring acculturation among male Arab immigrants in the United States: an exploratory study. J Immigr Health. 2005;7(3):179–84.
26
Ray MA. The richness of phenomenology: philosophic, theoretic, and methodologic concerns. In: Morse JM, editor. Critical issues in qualitative research methods. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage publications; 1994. pp. 117–133.
27
Creswell JW. Qualitative inquiry & research design: choosing among five approaches. 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications; 2007.
28
Groenewald T. A phenomenological research design illustrated. Intl J Qual Methods. 2004;3(1):42–55.
29
Whiting LS. Analysis of phenomenological data: personal reflections on Giorgi’s method. Nurse Res. 2002;9(2):60–74.
30
George D. SPSS for windows step by step: a simple guide and reference, 16.0 update. 9th ed. Boston: Pearson/A and B; 2009.
31
EuroHalal—Office of control and certification. Definition and concept of Halal; 1992 [cited 2018 Apr 2]. Available from: https://www.eurohalal.be/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=10&Itemid=15&lang=en.
32
Ryder AG, Alden Or LE, and Paulhus DL. Is acculturation unidimensional or bidimensional? A head-to-head comparison in the prediction of personality, self-identity, and adjustment. J Pers Soc Psychol. 2000;79(1):49–65.
33
Misra A and Ganda OP. Migration and its impact on adiposity and type 2 diabetes. Nutrition. 2007;23(9):696–708.
34
Rosenmöller DL, Gasevic D, Seidell J, and Lear SA. Determinants of changes in dietary patterns among Chinese immigrants: a cross-sectional analysis. Int J Behav Nutr Phys Act. 2011;8(1):42.
35
Varghese S and Moore-Orr R. Dietary acculturation and health-related issues of Indian immigrant families in Newfoundland. Can J Diet Pract Res. 2002;63(2):72–79.
36
Marquis M and Shatenstein B. Food choice motives and the importance of family meals among immigrant mothers. Can J Diet Pract Res. 2005;66(2):77–82.
37
Kaiser LL, Melgar-Quiñonez HR, Lamp CL, Johns MC, and Harwood JO. Acculturation of Mexican-American mothers influences child feeding strategies. J Am Diet Assoc. 2001;101(5):542–47.
38
Ricciuto L, Tarasuk V, and Yatchew A. Socio-demographic influences on food purchasing among Canadian households. Eur J Clin Nutr. 2006;60(6):778–90.

Information & Authors

Information

Published In

cover image Canadian Journal of Dietetic Practice and Research
Canadian Journal of Dietetic Practice and Research
Volume 80Number 4December 2019
Pages: 172 - 178

History

Version of record online: 25 March 2019

Authors

Affiliations

Rana Aljaroudi PhD
School of Public Health & Health Systems, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON
Susan Horton PhD
School of Public Health & Health Systems, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON
Rhona M. Hanning PhD, RD, FDC
School of Public Health & Health Systems, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON

Metrics & Citations

Metrics

Other Metrics

Citations

Cite As

Export Citations

If you have the appropriate software installed, you can download article citation data to the citation manager of your choice. Simply select your manager software from the list below and click Download.

Cited by

1. Food Experiences and Dietary Patterns of International Students at a Canadian University

View Options

Get Access

Login options

Check if you access through your login credentials or your institution to get full access on this article.

Subscribe

Click on the button below to subscribe to Canadian Journal of Dietetic Practice and Research

Purchase options

Purchase this article to get full access to it.

Restore your content access

Enter your email address to restore your content access:

Note: This functionality works only for purchases done as a guest. If you already have an account, log in to access the content to which you are entitled.

View options

PDF

View PDF

Full Text

View Full Text

Media

Media

Other

Tables

Share Options

Share

Share the article link

Share on social media