The effect of free school fruit on academic performance: a nationwide quasi-experiment

Abstract

AbstractIn past research, higher intake of fruit has been associated with better academic achievement. Can the provision of one piece of fruit every school day improve children’s academic performance? In Norway, the government required all lower secondary schools to provide fruit to their pupils from 2007 to 2014. The policy also covered schools with combined elementary and lower secondary education (1st to 10thgrade), but not ordinary elementary schools (1stto 7thgrade). This differentiation, in combination with administrative data on test scores before, during, and after the law was enforced, created a nationwide quasi-experiment. Population register data on parents’ sociodemographic characteristics allowed for targeted analyses of a subsample with lower grades and lower fruit intake (boys of low socioeconomic status). In pre-registered analyses, we found no evidence that exposure to the free school fruit policy improved academic performance in the subsample or the entire population of Norwegian pupils. The free fruit policy coincided with a slight decline in performance among pupils covered by the policy. In a Western country with low levels of food insecurity, a policy that required schools to provide free fruit to pupils did not improve learning and may even have interfered with learning.Significance StatementThe intake of fruit is believed to be beneficial for children’s concentration, and research has linked a higher intake of fruit to better academic performance. During a national policy that made it mandatory for some types of elementary schools to provide one daily piece of fruit to every pupil, we did not observe any beneficial effects on learning. On the contrary, the policy coincided with a slight performance decline. Even for low-socioeconomic boys, who have lower-than-average grades and a lower intake of fruit, there was no improvement in academic results associated with the policy. We speculate that the policy may have required resources that otherwise would be used for teaching or teaching-related administration.