Status of Dietary Life Related Knowledge, Self-Efficacy, Food Preference and Dietary Behavior of Preschoolers in Kyunggi Area

A Reum Lee; Ye Lee Yu; Hye Jin Kim; Kyung A Kim; Kyung Won Kim

doi:10.5720/kjcn.2016.21.3.274

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Korean J Community Nutr. 2016 Jun;21(3):274-283. Korean. Published online June 30, 2016. https://doi.org/10.5720/kjcn.2016.21.3.274
Copyright © 2016 The Korean Society of Community Nutrition


Status of Dietary Life Related Knowledge, Self-Efficacy, Food Preference and Dietary Behavior of Preschoolers in Kyunggi Area
A Reum Lee, Ye Lee Yu, Hye Jin Kim, Kyung A Kim and Kyung Won Kim
Food and Nutrition, Seoul Women's University, Seoul, Korea.
Corresponding author: Kyung Won Kim. Food and Nutrition, College of Natural Sciences, Seoul Women's University, 621 Hwarangro, Nowon-gu, Seoul 01797, Korea. Tel: (02) 970-5647, Fax: (02) 976-4049, Email: kwkim@swu.ac.kr

Received April 30, 2016; Revised June 19, 2016; Accepted June 23, 2016.
This is an Open-Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract
Objectives The purpose of the study was to examine dietary life characteristics such as knowledge, self-efficacy and dietary behavior of preschoolers in Namyangju, Kyunggi-province, Korea. Methods The survey questionnaire was developed based on literature review. Preschoolers aged 4-5 years (n=208) responded to the questionnaire to measure knowledge, self-efficacy, food preference, and dietary behavior. After excluding incomplete responses, the data of 197 subjects were used for analysis. Results Mean score of dietary life knowledge was 8.0 out of 12, showing a low level of knowledge. Two out of 12 knowledge items were significantly different by gender. Percentage of correct answer on items of 'foods to make bones strong' and 'kinds of fast foods' was higher in girls than in boys (p<0.05). Total score of self-efficacy regarding dietary life was 40.1 (possible score: 12~48), on average. Compared to girls, boys had more confidence in 'not over-eating', and 'eating balanced meals with meat, fish and vegetables' (p<0.05). Boys scored higher on total score of food preference than girls (p<0.01). The preference for fruits was quite high. Among food items, boys scored higher on the preference for rice (p<0.01), fish (p<0.01), pork (p<0.05), beef (p<0.05), milk (p<0.01), and ice cream (p<0.05) than girls. Boys also liked fast foods more than girls did, showing preference for chicken (p<0.01) and soda (p<0.05). Compared to girls, boys showed more desirable behavior in 'eating breakfast everyday' (p<0.01). Dietary behavior was significantly correlated with self-efficacy (r=0.52, p<0.01), food preference (r=0.35, p<0.01), and knowledge (r=0.25, p<0.01) of subjects. Conclusions In this study, we observed differences in food preference by gender. Dietary behavior of preschoolers was correlated with several factors, including dietary life related knowledge, self-efficacy and food preference. Thus, it is needed to develop nutrition education programs focusing on increasing dietary life related knowledge and self-efficacy, and consider the differences in food preference of preschoolers by gender.


Keywords: dietary behavior; knowledge; self-efficacy; food preference; preschooler

Tables


	Table 1 General characteristics of the study subjects
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	Table 2 Knowledge regarding dietary life of subjects
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	Table 3 Self-efficacy regarding dietary life of subjects
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	Table 4 Food preference of the study subjects
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	Table 5 Dietary behavior of the study subjects
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	Table 6 Correlation among dietary life related knowledge, self-efficacy, food preference and dietary behavior of the study subjects
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Acknowledgments

This research was supported by a grant from Namyangju City Government (2015).

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