title: The Spouse's Level of Education and Individuals' Dietary Behaviors in China.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  There has been a growing interest in understanding relationships between educational attainment of an individual and his or her spouse's health. However, the issue has not been extensively studied, particularly in East Asian nations.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  We investigated the relation between individuals' specific dietary behaviors and their spouses' educational attainment in China.
  
  
  METHODS
  A total of 2071 individuals were surveyed in the 2012 Zhuzhou Healthy City Project, in China. Multivariate logistic regressions were used to model two specific individual dietary behaviors (i.e., oil intake and salt intake) as a function of own and their spouses' educational attainment. The models were also constructed by gender.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Spouses' education was positively associated both with individuals' oil intake and salt intake after adjusting for the demographic characteristics, socioeconomic status, and health knowledge. Also, females (i.e., wives) were more likely to benefit from her spouse's education in terms of healthy dietary behaviors. When his or her spouse's level of education were greater, an individual was more likely to meet the dietary guidelines of salt and oil intakes. This Chinese study supports the male dominance hypothesis (i.e., males are more influential on female's health behavior) and the highest status dominance hypothesis (i.e., individuals with higher socioeconomic status are more influential on those with lower status). In terms of the social cognitive theory, married couples exchange health knowledge and share health behaviors.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Spouses' educational attainment and health knowledge should be incorporated into the design of health promotion programs targeting married couples in China. Finally, additional theoretical explanations and implications are evaluated in this article.
authors.affiliation: China Center for Health Development Studies, Peking University, National Health Development Research Center, Mailbox 505, No. 38 Xueyuan Road, Haidian District, 100191, Beijing, China, wangqing1984@hsc.pku.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Qing
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Takashi
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Yamashita
authors.forename: Jin
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.forename: Jay J
authors.initials: JJ
authors.lastname: Shen
authors.forename: Scott
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Neishi
authors.forename: Gang
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Cheng
authors.forename: Qingyue
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Meng
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D002681:China; D004522:Educational Status; D005247:Feeding Behavior; D005260:Female; D006293:Health Promotion / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012923:Social Class; D018454:Spouses / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires