Walking the talk: Fit WIC wellness programs improve self-efficacy in pediatric obesity prevention counseling.

Six sites of the California Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) participated in a staff wellness pilot intervention designed to improve staff self-efficacy in counseling WIC clients about childhood overweight. A pre-post test design with intervention and control groups was used; outcome measures included staff perceptions of the intervention's effects on the workplace environment, their personal habits and health beliefs, and their counseling self-efficacy. Intervention site staff were more likely to report that the workplace environment supported their efforts to make healthy food choices (P <.

Counseling Latina mothers of preschool children about weight issues: suggestions for a new framework.

Objective: To assess Latina mothers' health beliefs and attitudes regarding early childhood weight issues and to use the information to update current nutrition education methods.

Design: Data were collected in eight focus group sessions using a semistructured questionnaire.

Subjects/setting: Forty-three Latina mothers (and grandmothers) with children aged 2 to 5 years were recruited at five different Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children sites in California.