The purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness of vegetable related nutrition educations by making a comparative analysis of nutrition knowledge on vegetables, dietary attitude, awareness of vegetables, vegetable-eating experiences and pre...
The purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness of vegetable related nutrition educations by making a comparative analysis of nutrition knowledge on vegetables, dietary attitude, awareness of vegetables, vegetable-eating experiences and preference for vegetables between two different fourth-grade groups of students in an elementary school located in Gyeongnam province after the school nutritionist provided education to just one of the two groups.
The subjects in this study were 129 fourth grade students. An experimental group and a control group were organized with 67 and 62 students respectively, and the experimental group received nutrition education four times, 40 minutes each, once a week. A self-administered survey was conducted twice before and after the experimental teaching in order to evaluate the effect of the nutrition education program, and the analyzable answer sheets from 122 respondents who included 61 members of the experimental group and 61 members of the control group were analyzed. The response rate stood at 94.5%. The findings of the study were as follows:
As a result of investigating whether there were any changes in the nutrition knowledge of the experimental and control groups about vegetables, the experimental group showed a rise of 1.08 from a score of 5.01 in the pretest to 6.10 in the posttest, and the change was significant(p<.001). The control group showed a rise of 0.41 from 5.49 in the pretest to 5.90 in the posttest as well, but the difference between the two scores was not significant. In terms of nutrition knowledge on vegetables, both groups scored higher in the posttest than in the pretest, but the experimental group that received the education showed a bigger increase in their scores than the control group that didn't.
Whose advice they took when they ate vegetables was asked after the education was provided, and the largest number of the experimental group members(37.7%) replied that they listened to the school nutritionist's advice, and the largest number of the control group members(49.2%) replied that they followed their parents' advice. and then intergroup gap was significant(p<.001).
When their intake of vegetables was checked, the experimental group showed a 6.15% increase in the intake of vegetables from 89.34% in the pretest to 95.49 % in the posttest while, the control group showed just a 1.43% increase from 92.21% in the pretest to 93.65% in the posttest. There was little change in the control group's vegetable intake. Both groups ate more vegetables after the education was conducted, but the experimental group showed a greater increase than the control group.
As for vegetables preference, the experimental group had a greater liking for every listed vegetable except lotus root after they received the education, and the control group had a greater preference for bracken, green onion and pumpkin only. The experimental group was more fond of vegetables after the education was offered, but there was little change in preference of the control group.
As a result of analyzing the satisfaction of the experimental group with the nutrition education program about vegetables, 41 out of 61 students, which accounted for 67.2%, answered that the nutrition instruction was intriguing, and 62.3% replied that they acquired nutrition knowledge thanks to the instruction.
In conclusion, the nutrition education program of vegetables provided to fourth graders was effective at improving their nutrition knowledge of vegetables, increasing their intake of vegetables offered by school meals, boosting their awareness of and preference for vegetables and increasing their vegetable-eating experience. Therefore nutrition education should be conducted by nutrition experts to reduce the amount of uneaten foods in school meals and help elementary school students acquire the right dietary habits. In addition, sustainable and systematic nutrition education programs should be implemented to continuously improve the nutrition knowledge and dietary habits of elementary students.