Kathryn Walton
Assistant Professor
College of Social and Applied Human Sciences, Family Relations & Applied Nutrition
About
Kathryn Walton, PhD, RD (she/her) is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Family Relations & Applied Nutrition at the University of Guelph. Dr. Walton completed a Bachelor's of Applied Science (2011) and a Masters of Science (2013) at the University of Guelph, followed by a Dietetic Internship at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre (2014), a PhD at the University of Guelph (2018) and a Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids) from 2018-2022.
Dr. Walton’s research program focuses on developing evidence-based best practices for feeding all children to support their healthy growth and development. Her work examines children’s eating behaviours, diet quality, and body composition, as well as food parenting and parent-child interactions during mealtimes. She also considers how aspects of the home environment, such as family stress, may impact children’s health. Dr. Walton is particularly interested in supporting families with children at high risk of eating difficulties, including children born preterm and with neurodevelopmental disorders.
Dr. Walton is also the Associate Director of the Guelph Family Health Study, a family-based cohort study designed to identify early-life risk factors of chronic disease and test strategies to support healthy behaviours among children and their families.
Research interests: pediatric nutrition, food parenting, eating behaviours, preterm birth, neurodevelopmental disorders, family meals, obesity
Education
PhD in Applied Human Nutrition (AHN)- University of Guelph, 2018
Registered Dietitian, Ontario- 2014
MSc (AHN)- University of Guelph, 2013
BASc (AHN)- University of Guelph, 2011
Current Projects
- Working towards the development of a dyadic feeding quality monitor: elucidating the neurobiological and social factors underpinning responsive feeding of hospitalized children with disabilities (co-PI Dr. Tom Chau)
- Growth, Eating & Appetite Together (GrEAT) Babies Pilot Study: Examining associations between responsive feeding, infant eating behaviour and body composition among very low birth weight infants compared to term-born peers at 4 months corrected age
- Understanding the nutrition supports available in Canadian Neonatal Follow-up Clinics
- Optimizing Mothers’ Milk for Preterm Infants (OptiMoM) Grows Up: Understanding how nutrition during neonatal hospitalization is associated with brain development, growth and eating habits during childhood (project PIs are Drs. Deborah O’Connor & Sharon Unger)
- Beyond the Plate: Engaging Youth to understand their experiences with celiac disease and the gluten-free diet (project led by my PhD student, Alyssa Ramuscak)
- Guelph Family Health Study
Courses Taught
- Nutr*2050: Nutrition Through the Lifecycle
- Nutr*3110: Food Security
- Nutr*4070: Nutrition Communication & Knowledge Translation
- Nutr*4900: Selected Topics In Applied Human Nutrition