Objective: In the first instance this scoping review aims to identify and collate definitions of a school food environment, and secondly to identify measures/tools that have been used to assess characteristics of school food environments.
Introduction: The school food environment provides an opportunity to support healthy food behaviours in children and adolescents, during a pinnacle phase of development. However limited studies have been conducted to clearly define and contextualise the term. Given the high rates of childhood obesity in the Pacific Islands region, a greater understanding of school food environments globally may inform future development of policy and research for Pacific Islander populations.
Inclusion criteria: This scoping review will examine all evidence that aims to define, describe, conceptualize and measure the school food environment in early childhood, primary and secondary school communities within a global context. Quantitative, qualitative and mixed methods studies published in peer-review journals will be considered, as will grey literature sources such as government reports, organisation reports, research reports, theses and dissertations.
Methods: Searches for key publications will be conducted in Web of Science (Clarivate), CABI (via CABI inter-face), and Scopus (Elsevier) with Google Scholar and Google used to search for unpublished studies/grey literature. Results will be limited to the past 20 years and all languages considered. Data extraction will be undertaken by two independent reviewers using a data extraction tool. Data will be presented categorically, and themes presented quantitatively. A narrative summary will accompany presented results.