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The Relationship of Family Characteristics to the Nutritional Status of Pre-School Children

Several investigators have studied the effect of income source and economic status, population pressure, nutrient intake, employment, traditions, habits, and practices on nutritional status (1-12). However, only a few of these studies have indicated the variables most significantly related to preschool child malnutrition. In his study of three population classes in rural India, Levinson (7) reported that the most significant variables for malnutrition in young children are caloric intake and diarrhoeal infection. Caloric intake is, in turn, determined by the mother’s knowledge of proper nutrition and by income, the latter becoming increasingly more significant as the child grows older. The result of the study made by Kreysler (6) in Botswana indicated that the economic factors of a non-supporting father and lack of cropland or livestock are the most important in predicting malnutrition in children. The present study investigates the influence of such factors as education of parents, household size, family income, home ownership, birth order, and type of infant feeding on the nutritional status of the pre-school child, using percentage of standard weight for age as the dependent variable to characterize families, and applying the information obtained in predicting nutritional status of families for nutrition programme targeting.