The effectiveness of a program for self-awareness and self-efficacy development in abdominal obesity housewives at Ta Kuk Subdistrict, Khwao Sinrin District, Surin Province

Abstract

     The purposes of the quasi-experimental research were to study the effects of a program for self-awareness and self-efficacy development on self-awareness,  self-efficacy,  food consumption behaviors,  exercise behaviors,  outcome expectation,  waist circumference  and body mass index of abdominal obesity housewives at Ta Kuk subdistrict,  Khwao Sinrin district, Surin province. The sample included  68 housewives aged 35-59 years who had body mass index and waist circumference over standard.  The housewives were selected by the simple random sampling technique and put into the experimental and comparative groups which each group comprised 34.  Research tools include: 1) the program for self-awareness and self-efficacy development which developed based on the self-awareness theory of  Duval and Wicklund (1982) and the self-efficacy theory of Bandura (1988).  The duration of the program was 10 weeks. The activities comprised: (1) lecture, video watching, skills training, workbook doing, (2) telling successful experiences, (3) health model, (4) verbal persuasions by buddy, and (5) emotional arousal.  2) Questionnaires comprised seven sections:  general information, self-awareness, self-efficacy,  food consumption behaviors,  exercise behaviors,  outcome expectation  and physical examination.  Content validity indexes (CVI) were 0.84-0.95, and Cronbach’s alpha coefficients were 0.80-0.93.  3) Housewife manual  and 4) waist tape and digital weight scales. Data were analyzed by descriptive statistics and t- test. The results revealed as follows. After attending the program, self-awareness, self-efficacy, food consumption behaviors, exercise behaviors, outcome expectation of the experimental group were significantly better than before attending the program, as well as, these results were better than the control group (p< .05). Also, waist circumference and body mass index of the experimental group were significantly less than before attending the program, but there was no difference between the experimental group and  the control group (p > .05).