Measuring changes in nutritional knowledge: a nutrition education intervention among primary school children in Trinidad and Tobago

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: To measure changes in nutritional knowledge among primary school children aged 6-12 years in Trinidad and Tobago. DESIGN AND METHODS: This study utilized a randomized experimental design. Eight government primary schools from two geographical regions with students aged 6-12 years from varied socioeconomic status in Trinidad participated in the study. A paired design, matched on geographical region and school population size was used to randomly assign schools to one of the four groups, i.e., (1) menu modification plus and nutrition education (MM plus NE), (2) menu modification (MM) alone, (3) nutrition education (NE) alone, and (4) control group. RESULTS: An analysis of changes in nutrition knowledge score on the 15-item pre/post tests indicated higher scores for three groups MM plus NE, NE alone, and the control. Specifically, a statistically significant mean increase from baseline of 1.47 points for MM plus NE group, 0.61 points for NE group, and 1.19 points for the control group was found. Statistically significant differences were observed in the treatment groups receiving NE when compared to the control for level of nutrition knowledge. At post-intervention, the highest score was in the MM plus NE (p < 0.01), which was significantly higher than the control or MM. Further, mean knowledge scores for NE and MM plus NE were significantly higher than MM (p < 0.01). CONCLUSION: The researchers concluded that both interventions together had greater improvements in knowledge scores than the MM alone group but not compared to the control group.