Impact Analysis of ICT based Educational Intervention on Change in Consumption of Junk Food Among School Going Children in Jaipur: A Vis a Vis Study

Abstract

Introduction and Objectives of Research Study: World data revealed the facts that twenty-first-century school-going children are more inclined towards the consumption of junk food especially during the COVID 19 pandemic period and this habit of consuming junk food is recognized as a serious health problem around the globe. Thus in this backdrop, the present research framework aims to assess the effectiveness of an ICT based educational intervention program for school going children in Jaipur Metropolitan City, India to reduce junk food consumption habits. Research Methodology: In the present research study data was collected with the help of a simple random sampling technique from n=200, school-going children of study area Jaipur. Primary data collection tool- a self-developed structured questionnaire was used in the present study. Data was collected in a phased manner i.e. Pre-test before intervention study and post-test after the ICT based interactive study. For statistical analysis, a multiple linear regression model and a paired t-test were used to assess the effectiveness of ICT based educational intervention programs in the present research study. Findings and Conclusion: Findings obtained from the present study concluded that among school children of Jaipur the behavioural intention of junk food consumption was different in pretest and posttest [4.98 ± 1.6 and 6.84 ± 1.2]. The present research study concludes that the ICT based intervention program developed by the research scholar has been proved as an effective education program for changing the intentions of school-going children and also prevent them from making the habit of consuming junk food which was found statistically significant at the p-value <0.05. It was also found from the study that, the behavioural intention of junk food consumption, the attitude of school-going children towards junk food consumption, and perceived behavioural control toward junk food were statistically significant as the obtained p-value was <0.05. Implications of the study: In a nutshell, it can be postulated from the present research study that ICT based intervention program has a significant positive influence on the perceived behaviour without a control group of school-going children in the study area Jaipur and the same findings can be used unanimously in other study conditions around the globe.