The development, evaluation, and pilot-test of a nutrition education tool kit at a mobile food pantry in Virginia.

Authors

Caitlin Swanson, James Madison UniversityFollow

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.

Date of Graduation

5-12-2022

Semester of Graduation

Spring

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department

Department of Kinesiology

Second Advisor

Jennifer Walsh

Third Advisor

Laura Desportes

Abstract

Objective: The purpose of this study was to develop, test and evaluate a nutrition education tool kit at a mobile food pantry (MFP) in rural Virginia.

Design: Cross-sectional, mixed methods approach using both quantitative and qualitative data to evaluate the effectiveness of a tool kit training at increasing participant self-efficacy, basic nutrition knowledge and perceived readiness to conduct a nutrition lesson with MFP guests. The ability for participants to translate the training into practice was also observed and documented.

Setting: Pilot tested on March 11^th 2020 at the Timberville Blue Ridge Area Food Bank MFP site.

Participants: A total of 4 participants, 3 females 1 males, ages 23-72 years, all white/Caucasian, recruited by the food bank’s volunteer coordinator.

Main outcome measures: Pre/post test score differences to assess knowledge, self-efficacy and perceived readiness. Self-efficacy of the participant tool kit training implementation. Qualitative feedback to converge validity of the quantitative data

Results: Pre/post-test mean score changes increased overall for each participant, but varied by how much within participants and based on their volunteer history with the food bank. Self-efficacy mean scores of how well participants translated the information from the tool kit training into practice ranged between 69%- 83%. Qualitative data was used to converge the validity of the quantitative data showing improvements to overall knowledge, self-efficacy and perceived readiness.

Conclusions and Implications: The study shows a promising direction for implementing nutrition education programs at MFPs. Future studies should expand on this pilot-test to further confirm these findings.