Beyond knowledge in nutrition education

Background: Nutrition education programs often focus on transferring nutrition information to participants with the goal of motivating them to make dietary changes. Objective: This study examined the associations between parental nutrition knowledge and preschooler dietary intake. The study also explored the relative importance of nutrition information in parental decision-making when shopping for and preparing food for young children. Methods: A sample of 721 Texas households with at least one child between the ages of 1 and 5 years completed a 30-minute telephone interview assessing child's usual food intake, as well as knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors related to child feeding. The sample included WIC households, low-income non-WIC households, and higher-income households. Fifty percent of the sample was Hispanic. Results: A multivariate linear regression model indicated that parental nutrition knowledge was not related to children's intake of fruits and vegetables or sweets (ß=-.018). Parental self-efficacy for buying, preparing and serving fruits and vegetables was the factor most strongly correlated with child fruit and vegetable intake (ß=.236). Additionally, respondents at all income levels were more significantly more concerned with cost than with nutrition content when shopping for food (p<.05). This difference was strongest for lower-income families than for higher-income families. Child preference was the strongest motivator and nutritional content the weakest for parents when deciding what to feed their children (p<.05). Implications: These results suggest that, instead of focusing on knowledge transmission, nutrition interventions should include a focus on parent self-efficacy, perceived value versus of food and child preference.