Nutrition Science and Everyday Application - beta v 0.1

INTRODUCTION TO NUTRITION SCIENCE AND INFORMATION LITERACY 81
Whole 30 diet has been life-changing. They’re all trying to convince you to join them in their
latest diets, but your head is swimming. They can’t all be right, and you don’t want to just
follow the latest fad. You want to find accurate information that’s based on solid scientific
evidence. How can you identify it in a sea of conflicting and overwhelming information? Who
can you trust?
It can be hard to filter through it all, especially when it’s attached to strong opinions,
emotions, and people trying to sell their product or point-of-view. And yet, we all need
to make choices about what to eat, at the very least for ourselves, and often for others.
You may have the responsibility of feeding family members in different stages of life, with
different needs and preferences. And if you work in the health professions, you may have
patients or clients who look to you as a source of reliable information about nutrition. Of
course, the problem of conflicting and overwhelming information is not unique to nutrition;
you’ll find the same issue in many other health-related fields, and beyond.
Now, more than ever, it’s essential to develop skills in information literacy, including the
ability to find information, evaluate whether it is accurate and useful, and apply it effectively.
The purpose of this unit is to develop and hone your skills in information literacy as it
applies to nutrition. You’ll learn about the scientific method, because it forms the foundation
of how we know what we know about nutrition. You’ll learn about the different types of
research studies and each of their advantages and limitations. We’ll discuss various sources
of information, such as scholarly and popular sources, how each of them can be useful in
different ways, and how to evaluate them. We’ll also discuss careers in nutrition and the
different types of skills that you’ll find among nutrition experts.
Unit Learning Objectives
After completing this unit, you should be able to:
1. Identify the sequential steps of the scientific method, and understand the importance of reporting
research results in peer-reviewed journals.
2. Describe the different types of research studies used in nutrition, including the quality of evidence,
advantages, and limitations of each.
3. Be aware of some of the limitations of nutrition research, including the challenges of studying complex
dietary patterns and the influence of industry funding.
4. Understand differences between scholarly (peer-reviewed) and popular sources for nutrition
information.
5. Evaluate sources of nutrition information and distinguish between credible sources and junk science.
6. Identify the qualifications of nutrition professionals and career opportunities in the field of nutrition.
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