Association of nutrition knowledge, attitude and diet quality with weight status among school going adolescents in Bhaktapur Municipality, Nepal.

Thesis Report.

ABSTRACT:

Background: Knowledge, Attitude and Diet quality among the school going adolescent is raising public health issue in developing country like Nepal. Lack of nutritional knowledge and negative attitude towards the quality diet pattern may results in the poor growth and development of the adolescents. This research is expected to identify the association of the nutritional knowledge, attitude and perception toward the diet quality with weight status and generate an important finding. The objective of this study was to access the association on nutrition knowledge, attitude and diet quality among school going adolescent in Bhaktapur municipality, Bhaktapur, Nepal.

Methods: This study was School-based descriptive cross-sectional study design and multistage cluster random probability sampling. Here, semi structured questionnaire was used which consisted of socio-demographic information, behavior information, nutritional knowledge, attitude, and diet quality to collect the primary data through faceto-face interview technique. Chi2 test and One-way variance analysis (ANOVA) were used to observe the association between variables of interest.

Results: In the 480 participants, the study concludes that 3.13 % and 5.63 % were underweight and Overweight/Obese respectively. There was no significant association between nutrition knowledge with weight status. Attitudes towards nutrition knowledge cluster in emotional eating, Uncontrolled eating and Cognitive Restrained was not significant with weight status. Status of diet quality was not significantly associated with weight status. Similarly, there was significant association between age of respondents, gender, type of school, religion, father education and weight status. There was no significant association of caste, type of family, mother education and parental occupation with weight status.

Conclusion: The study provides the importance of nutrition knowledge, attitude towards nutrition, diet quality and weight status of school going adolescents.

Key words: Nutrition knowledge, Attitude, Diet quality, Weight status