title: U.S. Migration, Translocality, and the Acceleration of the Nutrition Transition in Mexico.
abstract: Migrant flows are generally accompanied by extensive social, economic, and cultural links between origins and destinations, transforming the former's community life, livelihoods, and local practices. Previous studies have found a positive association between these translocal ties and better child health and nutrition. We contend that focusing on children only provides a partial view of a larger process affecting community health, accelerating the nutrition transition in particular. We use a Mexican nationally-representative survey with socioeconomic, anthropometric, and biomarker measures, matched to municipal-level migration intensity and marginalization measures from the Mexican 2000 Census to study the association between adult body mass and community migration intensity. Our findings from multi-level models suggest a significant and positive relationship between community-level migration intensity and the individual risk of being overweight and obese, with significant differences by gender and with remittance intensity playing a preponderant role.
authors.affiliation: Department of Geography and Population Program University of Colorado at Boulder.
authors.forename: Fernando
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Riosmena
authors.forename: Reanne
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Frank
authors.forename: Ilana Redstone
authors.initials: IR
authors.lastname: Akresh
authors.forename: Rhiannon A
authors.initials: RA
authors.lastname: Kroeger