Assessment of diet quality of adults from North Korea: using nutrition quotient (NQ) for Korean adults / 한국영양학회지

Purpose@#The purpose of this study was to assess the diet intake status and quality of adults from North Korea who had lived in Seoul and Gyeonggi-do, using the nutrition quotient (NQ) for Korean adults. @*Methods@#A number of 166 adults aged from 20 to 64 years were enrolled as study subjects.A structured questionnaire was used to collect information on their demographic characteristics, food consumption frequency, eating behaviors, and NQ. The NQ score was then used to measure the overall diet quality. The NQ score was composed of four major agebased categories. ‘Balance’, ‘Diversity’, ‘Moderation’, and ‘Dietary behavior’ were utilized as scores for measurements within each of the four categories. The scores for all four categories were summed up, resulting in the total NQ score. Participants’ age groups were stratified by 20’s, 30’s, 40’, and over 50’s. A χ2 test and generalized linear regression (GLM) model were used to assess a significance for difference of subject distribution in categorical and continuous variables in the food consumption frequency, eating behaviors, and NQ scores. @*Results@#Participants in younger age groups were more likely to report consumption of ramyeon, fast food, sweet and greasy baked products, processed beverage, delivery food, and night snacks than the older age groups. Most importantly, participants in 20’s age group were less likely to report the total NQ and moderation score than the 50’s age group. @*Conclusion@#In this study, the 20’s age group displayed a lower NQ characteristic for an unbalanced diet. Therefore, it is imperative for adults from North Korea to be given individualized diet instructions along with nutritional education programs.

The Development and Evaluation of a Nutrition Education Program including Sensory and Cooking Activity to Promote Vegetable Intake among School Aged Children

BACKGROUND: The aim of the study is the development of nutrition education program for promoting vegetable intakes of school aged children. METHODS: After a pilot study and consultations of experts, a program (composed of five lessons) that was emphasized the sensory and cooking activities based on the social cognitive theory was developed. Specially, we focused on enhance expectation, self-efficacy, and behavioral performance through the intervention. For a outcome evaluation survey tool was developed, too. The lessons once-a-week (total five lessons) and survey (pre and pro) were conducted to 20 school aged children. RESULTS: The distribution of children was 11.5 years (mean age), boys (25%), girls (75%). Compared to pre-survey, the result of post-survey was higher scores for self-efficacy and two items out of ten items in food neophobia category. And one items out of six items (unfamiliar vegetables), three items out of ten items (familiar vegetables) showed positive result in food neophilia category significantly (P<0.1). CONCLUSIONS: The education duration was short(5 weeks) but we could observe visible changes on self-efficacy, behavior performances for cooking and intention to intake vegetables non-preferred ones previously. Continuous applying and supplementing this nutrition education program may promote intake of vegetables among children.

The Development and Evaluation of a Nutrition Education Program including Sensory and Cooking Activity to Promote Vegetable Intake among School Aged Children

BACKGROUND@#The aim of the study is the development of nutrition education program for promoting vegetable intakes of school aged children.@*METHODS@#After a pilot study and consultations of experts, a program (composed of five lessons) that was emphasized the sensory and cooking activities based on the social cognitive theory was developed. Specially, we focused on enhance expectation, self-efficacy, and behavioral performance through the intervention. For a outcome evaluation survey tool was developed, too. The lessons once-a-week (total five lessons) and survey (pre and pro) were conducted to 20 school aged children.@*RESULTS@#The distribution of children was 11.5 years (mean age), boys (25%), girls (75%). Compared to pre-survey, the result of post-survey was higher scores for self-efficacy and two items out of ten items in food neophobia category. And one items out of six items (unfamiliar vegetables), three items out of ten items (familiar vegetables) showed positive result in food neophilia category significantly (P<0.1).@*CONCLUSIONS@#The education duration was short(5 weeks) but we could observe visible changes on self-efficacy, behavior performances for cooking and intention to intake vegetables non-preferred ones previously. Continuous applying and supplementing this nutrition education program may promote intake of vegetables among children.