Development of a Nutrient Diversity Metric and Its Convergent Validity With Dietary Quality in a Sample of Healthy US Adults

representative sample of the adult population in the US using the NHANES dataset.Methods: Data from various NHANES (1988)(1989)(1990)(1991)(1992)(1993)(1994)(1999)(2000)(2001)(2002)(2003)(2004)(2005)(2006)(2007)(2008)(2009)(2010)(2011)(2012)(2013)(2014)(2015)(2016)(2017)(2018) cycles for adults age 19+ (n76,324) were used.Pistachio consumers (PC) were defined as individuals who reported a pistachio food code on day 1 or day 2 dietary recalls.Neurocognitive variables were assessed using questionnaire data including Simple Reaction Time Task, the Symbol Digit Substitution Test, the Single Digit Learning Test, Word List Learning Test, Word List Recall Test, Animal Fluency Test, Digit Symbol Substitution Test, as well as questions focused on memory impairment and depression.Depression and anxiety were evaluated with the Depression Screening Score and several additional questions.The NCI two-part method was utilized to determine usual intake of pistachios.Regression analyses were conducted to assess associations between pistachio consumer status and neurocognitive variables.Covariates included age, gender, ethnicity, physical activity level, poverty income ratio level, weight status, current smoking status, and HEI-2020.Results: Less than 1% of adults were PC and usual intake of pistachios was 24.6 g/day among adult consumers.Adult male consumers (+6 g/day) and younger adult consumers (20-39 years; +8 g/day) had higher intakes of pistachios than adult female consumers and older adult consumers (60+ years), respectively.The 90 th percentile of pistachio usual intake was 41.6 g/day for adult consumers and per capita usual intake of pistachios was 0.16 g/day among adults.PC had a 15.9% lower frequency of anxiety compared to non-consumers in (NC) adults age 60+ years.Depression/anxiety also caused less difficulties (60% less) among adult PC age 20-59 y compared to NC.No other significant associations were present.Conclusions: The results of this cross-sectional regression analysis show that while pistachio consumption was not associated with many of the neurocognitive measures, it was inversely associated with anxiety frequency and depression/anxiety difficulties in adults.Future research is needed to better understand the relationship of pistachio intake with neurocognition.