Seafood ChoiCeS

Seafood Choices: Balancing Benefits and Risks
http://www.nap.edu/catalog/11762.html
C
Tables and Scenarios
BOX C-1
A Case Scenario—The Pregnant Woman a
Pregnant women are advised of the potential advantage to their fetuses
of EPA/DHA and other nutrients that seafood contains, as well as the
potential consequences of exposure to toxicants (both microbiological
and environmental). How do pregnant women balance these issues?
A woman establishes her food choices early in life and continues this
pattern as she matures (trajectory). Pregnancy is a major transition in
a woman’s life. If this is her first pregnancy, the woman may rely on her
family, her partner, medical professionals, and other authorities to provide
information upon which to base her food choices (reflecting cultural influences
and linked lives). If she has been pregnant before, she can base
her decisions on her previous experience. If new information has been
released since her last pregnancy (e.g., a seafood advisory), she may
be unaware of the emerging issues (contextual influences and timing in
lives) or she could consider them irrelevant to her own situation. Prior to
making her food choices, she may make conscious decisions regarding
which foods to eat or to avoid (adaptive strategies). For example, a
woman who has eaten shrimp as her primary seafood choice throughout
her life might consider choosing salmon during her pregnancy. If she
was raised on local fish in Wyoming but moved to Michigan at the start
of her pregnancy, she might cease to eat any fish (local or otherwise) in
response to fish advisories.
a Italicized words reflect key concepts of the Life Course Perspective (Wethington,
2005; Devine, 2005).
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