Effects Of A Nutrition Newsletter For Seniors on Actual and Perceived Knowledge of Food Labels

Abstract

LEARNING OUTCOME: To describe the effectiveness of a newsletter food label education program for older adults.The Nutrition Labeling and Education Act initiated widespread use of food labels (FL) to guide consumers in making more nutritious food selections. FL are potentially very beneficial to older adults, many of whom are following special diets. However, there are limited data on the impact of label-education programs for older consumers. This study was designed to evaluate the effectiveness of a 5-issue nutrition newsletter (NL) FL education program. The NL was designed using communication theory and a geriatric learning framework. Each issue had a page describing FL and appropriate interpretations of servings and nutrient values. Subjects (n=480) aged 60-74y were randomly selected from a hospital database (n= 11,650); 386 persons completed the study. A treatment and control design was used with two treatment groups - those who received NL (NLONLY) and those who received NL followed by telephone calls to assess its use (NLPLUS). Outcome measures were: nutrition knowledge, a seven-item scale; and perceived nutrition knowledge, a 5-item scale with Likert-type responses. Both tests were administered pre- and post-intervention. ANOVAs were performed using SPSS. There were no significant differences among the three groups for knowledge and perceived knowledge before the intervention. Post-intervention, those who did not receive NL (CONTROL) had significantly lower knowledge scores than NLPLUS (p<.001). CONTROL also scored significantly lower on perceived knowledge than NLONLY or NLPLUS groups (p<.01). The NL was an effective means of educating older adults about the FL. (Supported in part by the Howard Heinz Foundation)