Impact of educational intervention in promoting KAP of food label information to make healthier food choices among adolescents in Bangalore City

Abstract

Background: Increasing adolescent obesity, a reason for the onset of adult chronic diseases, has become an important public health priority. Food choices are impacted by the growing availability of processed and pre-packaged meals, the rise in eating out compared to eating at home, low nutrition literacy, and the inability to evaluate calorie and nutrient information. Objective: The objective is to assess the current knowledge, attitude, and practice (KAP) of the adolescents regarding food label information to make healthier food choices, to improve their KAP regarding the same through health education using pictorial representation, and to evaluate the effectiveness of the health education. Materials and Methods: An educational intervention study was performed among 200 adolescent students (13–15 years) in selected schools in Bangalore city. Health education was given using materials like charts, models, and posters in an interactive way. Pre-KAP and post-KAP were assessed using questionnaires. Results: The study comprised 145 (72.5%) girls and 55 (27.5%) boys with the mean age of 14.02 years. Only 102 (51%) were having knowledge that food labels must be read irrespective of health issues or disease. Only 81 (40.5%) calculated the total nutrient intake before taking food items before intervention, which was increased to 147 (73.5%) post intervention. Conclusion: The results of the present study successfully proved that nutritional educational intervention by pictorial representation was feasible and successfully improved the understanding and use of food label information for making healthier food choices among adolescents.

Keywords

• adolescents
• food labeling
• health education
• healthy diet
• nutrients