Culinary Nutrition Education Improves Home Food Availability and Psychosocial Factors Related to Healthy Meal Preparation Among Children.

Objective: To evaluate the effectiveness of a culinary nutrition education intervention on children's home food availability and psychosocial factors related to healthy meal preparation.

Design: Randomized-controlled trial.

Setting: Schools in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

Participants: Eighty-three school children aged 10-11 years and their parents.

Intervention: Twelve weeks of culinary nutrition education with 5 hands-on healthy meal preparation modules and a module with parents on home food availability (conducted every 2 weeks).

Main Outcome Measures: Psychosocial factors (knowledge, attitude, practice, and self-efficacy) related to healthy meal preparation and home food availability (fruits, vegetables, healthful foods, and less healthful foods) assessed via children and parents, respectively, using validated questionnaires at baseline, postintervention, and 3-month follow-up.

Analysis: Repeated measures ANOVA.

Results: Intervention group had a higher (P < 0.001) mean knowledge score (mean difference, 1.2), attitude (mean difference, 2.6), practice (mean difference, 4.4) and self-efficacy (mean difference, 3.9) of healthy meal preparation as compared with control group across 3-time points. Improvements were seen in the availability of fruits (mean difference, 3.0; P < 0.001), vegetables (mean difference, 2.4; P < 0.001), healthful foods (mean difference, 1.5; P < 0.001) and less healthful foods (mean difference, -0.9; P = 0.001), favoring the intervention group.

Conclusion And Implications: Culinary nutrition education had positive impact on children's psychosocial factors and home food availability, demonstrating the potential to improve children's nutrition.