Highlights
- •Knowledge levels about salt and sugar consumption affect attitudes toward protecting children against their harm.
- •It is important to increase adults’ knowledge levels to improve their protective attitudes.
- •The knowledge and attitude levels of the participants who consume high amounts of sugary foods and beverages were lower.
- •The knowledge and attitude levels of the participants who do not check the ingredients of foods and beverages were lower.
Abstract
Purpose
The study aimed to assess adults' knowledge levels about salt and sugar consumption
and their attitudes toward protecting children from excessive consumption of them.
Design and methods
A cross-sectional, methodological, descriptive, and correlational study design was
conducted. The study was carried out at a family health center and included 377 participants.
The results were analyzed using descriptive statistics, reliability analysis and multiple
regression.
Results
The participants' knowledge scores accounted for 1.7% of their attitude scores. The
participants' socio-demographic characteristics accounted for 13.9% of their knowledge
scores, and the model was statistically significant (F = 7.453, p < 0.001). The participants' socio-demographic characteristics accounted for 11% of
their attitude scores, and the model was statistically significant (F = 5.672, p < 0.001).
Conclusions
Children and adults should be protected from salt and sugar overconsumption, which
is a risk factor for many diseases. Therefore, adults' knowledge levels about salt
and sugar consumption and their attitudes toward protecting children from excessive
consumption of them should be improved. It is also important to teach adults how to
choose foods and beverages after checking their labels and how to be role models for
children in this regard.
Practice implications
The study results will contribute to the planning of experimental studies to protect
children from excessive salt and sugar consumption. In addition, the study results
will provide an infrastructure for the preparation of training programs about salt
and sugar consume according to the needs of different groups (older adults, young
adults etc.).
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: May 26, 2020
Accepted:
April 11,
2020
Received in revised form:
April 11,
2020
Received:
March 10,
2020
Identification
Copyright
© 2020 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
