SOURCE:

Faculty: Education
Department: Human Kinetics And Health Education

CONTRIBUTORS:

Orajekwe, V. N.
Okafor,J. O.

ABSTRACT:

Nutrition education is aimed at providing people with adequate information, skills, motivation and to help them consume appropriate food. Rural women are listed among the most-at-risk groups that lack adequate knowledge and positive attitudes towards nutrition. These result in nutritional problems such as malnutrition, increased risk of chronic diseases, stunting and foetal growth retardation among others. This study was designed to determine the effects of community-based nutrition education programme on the nutritional knowledge and attitudes of rural women in Idemili South L.G.A of Anambra State. The purpose of the study was to determine the effect of community based nutrition education programme on the nutritional knowledge and attitude scores of the mothers after nutrition education. The quasi experimental design was used because random assignment of subjects was not possible. The study was guided by eight research questions and eight null hypotheses. The population of the study comprised all the 220 women in all the social clubs in the 7 towns that make up Idemili South LGA. The sample consisted of 204 mothers in all the nine social clubs in the randomly selected nine villages. The main instrument used for data collection was validated Nutrition Knowledge and Attitude Questionnaire (NKAQ). The test items of the NKATQ were assessed for reliability using thirty (30) rural women from Umuoji in Idemili North L.G.A. The reliability value of 0.93 for the items in section B of the knowledge test was established using Kudder Richard (K – R20) method. The reliability of the attitude items on a four-point scale of Strongly Agreed, Agreed, Disagreed and Strongly Disagreed SA, A, D and SD was determined using Cronbach’s Alpha which gave a value of = 0.63. This signifies a large degree of intra-item coherence in interpretations and answers by the respondents. Thus the instrument was considered reliable. Mean score was used to answer the research questions, while the student t-test and ANOVA were used to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The result of the study, among others, showed that there was a significant difference (p<0.001) in the mean difference of nutritional knowledge score of the respondents before and after nutrition education. The mean difference score after instructions was significantly higher, (x̄=71.43) when compared with their mean (x̄=61.65) difference score before nutrition education. Similarly, there was a significant difference (p<0.001) in the mean difference of nutritional attitude score of subjects before and after nutrition education. The mean difference score after nutrition instructions was significantly higher, (x̄=71.89), as compared to the mean score before intervention, (x̄=61.21). Subjects whose ages ranged from 30-35 and 36-41 years gained higher nutritional knolweledge mean scores (x̄=11.02 and x̄=10.05 respectively after instructions. Those age 42 years and above gained the least, x̄=8.47. There was no significant difference P>0.05 in the mean difference of nutritional attitude score of the rural women of different levels of education. Also there was no significant difference P>0.05 in the mean difference of nutritional attitude score of the rural women when analyzed according to occupation. It was recommended that there was the need to include nutrition education programmes in the women annual general meetings, and other women gatherings in Nigeria. It is hoped that this will expose the women to adequate nutrition education which will improve their nutritional knowledge, as well as aid them in developing adequate positive attitudes towards nutrition.