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June 5, 2013 – Allegheny College senior Taylor Hinton will conduct a survey at the Second Saturday event at the Meadville Market House on June 8. Members of the community who take the survey will be rewarded with free seeds or Creative Crust cookies.

During the summer Hinton, who is majoring in environmental science at the college, is working on a set of surveys aimed at understanding the relationship between social interactions and family eating habits.

Hinton will conduct another version of the survey at the Second Saturday market on July 13 and then will return to the Market House on August 10 to share the results of her survey with the community and provide educational materials about social interactions and family mealtime.

Hinton’s research is being overseen by Kate Darby, an assistant professor of environmental science at the college.

“While we’re conducting Taylor’s research, we’re also helping out the Second Saturday market organizers by collecting demographic data and information about how attendees learned about the event,” said Darby. “We’ll analyze and share that information with organizers. This project is a great example of both a student research project and community engagement work.”

While Hinton conducts her survey, Darby will be administering a survey of her own to better understand how people in the community view the local food system and to find out what people would like such a system to look like in the future.

For more information about the project, contact Kate Darby at kdarby@allegheny.edu.