Comparisons of Consumption Attitude toward Vegetables and Fragrance Vegetables Preference among Primary School to University Students in Gyeongbuk Area / 대한지역사회영양학회지

OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this study was to provide the preliminary data for dietary education to increase students' vegetables intake. METHODS: The attitude of vegetables consumption (5-Likert scale), preference score (7-Likert scale) and eating frequency (5-Likert scale) of 9 fragrance vegetables were investigated by survey questionnaire. A total of 370 students enrolled in primary, middle, high schools, and university participated in the study and data were analyzed by the SPSS WIN (ver 12.0). RESULTS: About 40% of those surveyed answered that they do not eat some kinds of foods and 16% of students do not eat vegetables, the most unfavorable foods. The students in all groups (primary 2nd and 5th, middle and high school, university students) answered that they liked vegetables with the highest score in university students, and they did not often eat fragrance vegetables. Lower age student group, especially primary school 2nd showed more positive attitudes of eating challenge toward no experience, bad taste, and dislike but nutritious vegetable foods. The most important factor of vegetable preference was taste, the biggest reason of both like and dislike. Only 4 students designated nutrition as for vegetable dislike reason, means that all students knew about the nutritional importance of vegetables. It was shown that the color and flavor of the vegetables act as dislikable reason rather than likable reason. The significant correlations between preference score and intake frequency of fragrance vegetables were confirmed, and the younger the students the greater the correlation coefficient. CONCLUSIONS: Thus providing more chance to experience vegetables, such as fragrance vegetables and education about the importance of balanced diet will be an effective way of increasing vegetables intake, and the younger the students the greater the education effect.

The Differences in Preference for Vegetables among Primary School to University Students in Gyeongbuk Area / 대한지역사회영양학회지

OBJECTIVES: Vegetables are the most left over side dishes in school lunch programs. This study intended to analyze the differences in preference for vegetables among the students of different age groups in order to determine potential ways of increasing vegetable consumption in this study group. METHODS: A total of 308 primary to university students in Gyeongbuk area were recruited and a questionnaire-based survey was conducted. The preference score (7-Likert scale: very much dislike (1)~so-so (4)~like very much (7)) and intake frequency (5-Likert scale) of 48 kinds of vegetables in 4 vegetable groups, such as vegetable (fruit-, root-, leaf-, and stalk- vegetable), seaweeds, mushrooms, and kimchi were investigated, and data were analyzed by SPSS WIN (ver 12.0). RESULTS: The preference scores of vegetables except for seaweeds were significantly different among school groups, university was the highest, followed by high school. Primary and middle school students showed the lowest preference score, especially for leaf- and stalk- vegetables. The preference score for seaweeds was the highest of 5.28, followed by kimchi of 4.99. With regard to kimchis, the preference score was the highest in university', followed by high school, middle school, and primary school' was the lowest. The number of vegetables with < 4.0 preference score was the highest in primary school of 16, 15 in middle school, 11 in high school, and 7, the lowest in university. The vegetable with preference score of < 4.0 in all 4 school groups were mallow, chard, bud, radish leaf, mugwort, butterbur and sweet potato stalk. With regard to the intake frequency of vegetables, kimchis, an indispensable part of the Korean diet, was the highest of 2 times/day, followed by cooked vegetables of 1.5 times/day. The correlation coefficients between preference scores and intake frequencies were statistically significant in all groups of vegetables. As for the coefficient of variation (CV) of preference score, primary school' was the highest and university' was the lowest. The number of vegetables with high CV and high inexperience were highest in primary school students. CONCLUSIONS: Providing more opportunities for consuming a variety of vegetables, such as leaf- and stalk- vegetable, it may be possible to increase vegetable consumption, especially for the primary school students.