Health behavior promotion model vegetables and fruit consumption of students Aow Luek School, Krabi Province

Abstract

This participatory action research aimed to study model of health behavior promoting behavior in vegetables and fruit consumption of students at Aow Luek School, Krabi Province. The target group was 653 people consisting of 1) 43 operators, including administrators, teachers, parents, community leaders and student leaders, 2) The beneficiaries of the project which included 610 students. The tools used for data collection were observation form, in-depth interview questions and the group discussion guidelines. The data were collected from October 2017 to March 2018. Data were analyzed using basic statistics, frequency values, percentages and content analysis.
The results showed that the model and the process of promoting health behavior in vegetables and fruit consumption of students consisted of 1) the operators and the sponsors should work in cooperation as volunteers, 2) the operation process should be a participatory planning and a participatory implementation and work through various activities with continuous evaluation, 3) the results showed as follows: first, the number of students were increased in vegetables and fruit consumption from 25 percent to 100 percent. Second, the 44 students who did not consume vegetables and fruit at first started to adjust their eating behavior. Third, the well-being of students had increased after 6 months of promoting health behavior; less number of students absent from school (decreased from 20 to 5 students per day); less number of students receiving medicine from school first aid room (decreased from 12 to 2 students per day). Last, it appeared that the school could promote healthy eating habits to students continuously by using the model of health behavior promotion to enhance vegetables and fruit consumption which it could change students’ eating habits.