Nutrition education for student community volunteers: a comparative study of two different communication methods.

Background: Nutrition education for student volunteers can enhance their skills, and they can act as change agents in the community. There is a dearth of data from India on the effectiveness of different communication tools in providing nutrition education to student volunteers.

Objective: This study aims to examine the comparative effectiveness of two different methods of communication--lectures in the classroom aided by print material, and a televised version of a local folk-dance form--for providing nutrition education to student community volunteers in a South Indian state.

Methods: Interventions were conducted during two mega-camps of student volunteers (camps 1 and 2) with 70 and 137 participants, respectively. Their knowledge levels were tested at baseline. Camp 1 received the lecture intervention and camp 2 the televised folk-dance intervention. Knowledge scores were measured before and after the intervention in each camp, and the two camps were compared for significant improvements in knowledge.

Results: At baseline, the knowledge levels of students in both camps were comparable. Significant improvement in knowledge was observed in both camps after intervention (p < .05). Although there was no significant difference between the camps in improvement in knowledge, a significant difference was observed when only the positive increments (improvement over baseline) were compared.

Conclusions: The televised version of the folk-dance form was better in bringing about positive increment.