A pilot study to explore the challenges of changing children's food and health concepts

Abstract

Objective To investigate the effect of a nutrition education intervention and four hours of related teaching on the nutrition concepts of a sample of 9 year-old children. Design Prepost test design. Children's food classification concepts were assessed before and after the intervention and nutrition teaching. Setting Year 4 class of a suburban primary school in South Wales. Method The children completed a food classification task before and after visiting a health promotion exhibition and receiving lessons emphasising food/health related concepts. Results Comparison of the results before and after the intervention suggested that there was no significant change in the participant's conceptual understanding of food. Conclusion Children's food classification concepts remain resistant to change despite enhanced exposure to nutrition information.