The Association of Caregiver's Socioeconomic Factors and Infants Health and Weaning Practices from Korean National Health and Nutrition Survey

Abstract

The objective of this study was to examine the association of caregiver's socioeconomic factors such as residential area, level of education and income and infants weaning practices. The Korean National Health and Nutrition Survey was conducted on a stratified random sample (n = 9,968) in 2001. This study analyzed data of female (n = 245) aged between 20–49 years old living with infants aged between 0–2 years old. Data of birth height, birth weight, choice of breast feeding or formula feeding, duration of breast feeding, timing of milk supplement and complementary feeding and related issues were examined. The residential areas were divided such as metropolitan (46.9%), urban (36.7%), rural area (16.3%). The educational status was mostly junior college (61.6%) or college (34.3%) graduates. The levels of income were divided into low (33.8%), medium (45.3%), and high (20.1%). There were significant differences in birth height among residential area (p = 0.0038). The average heights of infants living in metropolitan area, urban and rural were 50.4 cm, 49.2 cm and 43.8 cm. There were significant differences in birth height between high and low level of income (p = 0.0292). The durations of breast feeding were different by level of income. Other factors related infant weaning practices were not different by residential area and level of income. These results suggest that caregiver's socioeconomic status appear to have influences on the anthropometry of infants and weaning practices.