Consumption Behavior of Overnutritional Pupils at Upper Level of Primary School in Kamphaeng Phet Province

Abstract

The purposes of this study were: 1) to compare the health belief and food consumption behavior between the pupils with normal nutritional status and those with overnutritional status, 2) to identify the factors related to food consumption behavior of the pupils; and to find out the factors influencing the nutritional status of the pupils. The samples were 258 pupils with normal nutritional status and 256 pupils with overnutritional status in the upper level of primary school in Muang District of Kamphaeng Phet Province in 2001. The questionnaire was used as a tool to find out the health beliefs and food consumption behavior. All data were analyzed by using descriptive statistics and non-parametric statistics. Category regression analysis was used to find the relationship between variable factors and food consumption behavior. Logistic regression analysis was also used to figure out which factors influencing the nutritional status of the pupils. At the .05 level of significance, the pupils with normal nutritional status and those with overnutritional status had different health belief and food consumption behavior. Those with overnutritional status had not only improper food consumption behavior of eating very rapidly but also consuming a lot of snack, fried food and soft drink. The factors related to the food consumption behavior in normal nutritional status were health belief, gender and family income, whereas father's education and drinking expense were related to food consumption behavior of the overnutritional status. The factors influencing the nutritional status were health belief, food consumption behavior, education of the parents. These factors could be used to classify the nutritional status correctly about 77.08 percent of the pupils.