Effectiveness of a Positive Deviance Program in Reducing Childhood Undernutrition

Plain-language summary

Globally, childhood malnutrition remains a public health concern. Malnutrition can be diverse from undernutrition to overnutrition. A young child, primarily refers to those under the age of 5, is suffering from undernutrition when the child is lacking of adequate nutrition that necessary for proper growth and health due to direct or indirect causes such as not having enough food. In fully urbanized area such as Kuala Lumpur, urban poor children tend to face greater deprivations such as lower education and poor health which significantly influence their daily diet and nutritional status. Hence, urban poor children who are living and growing up in such underprivileged environment should not be neglected. Since young children are generally depending on maternal feeding for daily diet, intervention that focus on encouraging positive change in maternal feeding practices might be efficient in reducing childhood undernutrition. The positive deviance (PD) approach may consider as a better alternative to empower mothers by promoting new behaviour to feed their children. Hence, this study aims to evaluate the effectiveness of a nutrition program using PD approach in reducing undernutrition among urban poor children aged 3 to 5 years old in Kuala Lumpur.

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