Healthy Eating/Nutrition

Hi ladies... I'm excited to work with you all!

Here is my post for blackboard... As the 'Nutrition Group' met for the first time I quickly observed that each group member felt compassionate about nutrition and more specifically healthy eating. After setting up our blogger site we discussed our first group project. This led to reflection on the day's topic of health promotion theories. The group was somewhat torn as to what our target audience should be and if group majority wins it appears it will be children (parents of children). As we began to dive into the thought of forming focus groups we realized that we would most likely have parents as our target audience but the aim would still be on healthy eating for children because of the influence a parent has over their child's diet.

Applying theories to a target group (parents) to get them to change behaviors of another person (children) is a bit more complex. Not only does the parent have to change their behavior to meet the intended outcome but they have to change their child's behavior to be successful. Wow, we all know how hard it is to have a successful intervention... this is really going to take some work!

As I was applying the Health Belief Model to the challenge of changing a parent's way of thinking about healthy eating and the importance of providing their children with a healthy diet it occurred to me that it might be easier for a parent to change their behavior if they know they are liable for (severity comes to mind) for their child's health. A health care professional may use an approach that a parent can relate to by telling them the dangers their children are in if they continue an unhealthy diet (severity) the health care profession can persuade a parent to choose healthier options for their child by providing them with information on what is healthy and provide recipes for meals they can prepare (cues to action). Other theories such as Stages of Change and Precaution Adoption Process Model are a little more difficult to apply to this example.

After this reflection maybe I'll try and persuade the 'healthy eating' group to select a different target audience (just kidding : )

On a side note, I'm also interested in looking at exploring the idea of a different target audience, children is a bit done so it might be difficult to get creative. Soda (or in the midwest 'pop' and college students might be a great idea, I'll try and brainstorm myself. I won't have internet access this weekend. I'm in Tahoe so I'll see you all Tuesday!