Nutrition Education Intervention for College Female Athletes

Abstract

Objective To evaluate the efficacy of a nutrition education intervention for college female athletes to improve nutrition knowledge, build self-efficacy with respect to making healthful dietary choices, and improve dietary intake. Design A pretest-posttest control group design was implemented. Participants A women's soccer team (n =15) and a women's swim team (n = 15) were randomly assigned to experimental and control groups, respectively. Intervention The intervention focused on nutrition knowledge, self-efficacy in making healthful dietary choices, and dietary practices to demonstrate treatment effect. Main Outcome Measures Dependent variables were nutrition knowledge, self-efficacy, and dietary practices. Independent variables were group assignment. Analyses The Mann-Whitney U test was used to analyze the results between groups, and the Fisher exact probability test was used to detect differences between groups in the number of positive dietary changes. Results Treatment participants significantly improved nutrition knowledge, self-efficacy ( P < .05), and the overall number of positive dietary changes ( P < .03). Conclusions This study reduces the paucity of nutrition education intervention research among athletes and demonstrates the ability to increase not only nutrition knowledge, which is typically reported, but also self-efficacy and improvement in overall positive dietary changes during an 8-week intervention.