Effects of Culturally Tailored Nutrition Education on Dietary Quality of Hispanic Mothers: A Randomized Control Trial

Abstract

Objective: To assess whether participation in a culturally tailored nutrition education program increases diet quality of Hispanic mothers.

Design: A randomized controlled trial.

Setting: Community centers and universities.

Participants: Sixty-five mothers (35 in experimental group, 30 in control group) completed pre- and postworkshop surveys. Eligibility criteria included being of Mexican or Puerto Rican descent and having a child between the ages of 6 and 18 years who could participate in the workshops with the parent.

Intervention: Families in the experimental group participated in a 6-week workshop series that included weekly nutrition education classes.

Main outcome measure: Diet quality was assessed by the Rate Your Plate questionnaire.

Analysis: Repeated measures ANOVA was used to compare differences between the experimental and control groups. A Wilcoxon signed rank test was conducted to test for significant shifts in categorization pre- and postprogram.

Results: There was a significant change in diet quality categorization after participating in the workshops (P < .001, effect size 0.39). No changes were found in the control group.

Conclusions and implications: Abriendo Caminos was effective at increasing the diet quality of Hispanic mothers who participated the most in the program. More research is needed in this at-risk population to determine the relationships among nutrition knowledge, diet quality, and achievement of healthy weight.

Keywords: Hispanic families; diet quality; health promotion; obesity; obesity prevention.