This week we discussed how formative research helps drive interventions. an interesting aspect to this not previously considered by moi, is that formative research is theory driven. There are multiple avenues one can take as well as different kinds of formative research. The three main types of formative research are focus groups, indepth interviews and surveys. In public health we use surveys as the most common tool in gathering data before implementing interventions. In our nutritional group, we need to conduct formative research in order to find out what are the demographics, psychographics and what the primary concerns of the population we mean to target are. The population in which we have decided to administer a media campaign to are SDSU college students living on campus between the ages of 18-24. Nutirtion within this group is usually overlooked due to many reasons. Some reasons why their nutrition may be overlooked does not necessarily have to do with the fact that it is not important but rather that there is an implied assumption that their needs are being met and that the school and dining services are following the national nutritional guidelines. thinking about that, i can only wonder if the natioanl nutritional guidelines are sufficent for this target population. Are there differences between grade school nutrtion, high school nutrition and college nutrition?
Stephanie E and I visited the dining hall on campus this morning. I was appalled at the selection. The only real options were waffles (made by students themsevles with premixed batter in pre-portioned cups) and an omlete bar. The fruit offered was canned and the bread was all white or sourdough. There was only one healthy cereal option and *surprise!* there was no nutritional information available about any of the foods offered.
When organizing our project i think it will be key to use indepth interviews with key informants and gatekeepers to discover what the real issues are.
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