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Journal article
A great way to bring up health behaviour topics at playgroup: a qualitative evaluation of the Healthy Conversations @ Playgroup program
BMC Public Health, Vol.24, pp.1-13
2024
PMID: 38528500
Abstract
The early years is a critical stage to establish optimal nutrition and movement behaviours. Community playgroups are a relaxed environment for parents with a focus on social connection and supporting parents in their role as 'First Teachers'. Playgroups are therefore an opportunistic setting to promote health behaviours in the early years. To support parents with young children around healthy lifestyle behaviours, the Healthy Conversations @ Playgroup program was delivered in urban and regional areas, across three Australian jurisdictions between 2021-2023.
This qualitative evaluation aimed to understand how the Healthy Conversations @ Playgroup program was experienced by parents, playgroup coordinators and peer facilitators.
Semi-structured virtual interviews and focus groups were conducted with parents, playgroup coordinators (i.e., person responsible for coordinating the playgroup) and peer facilitators (i.e., trained facilitator for the program) that participated in the Healthy Conversations @ Playgroup study. Transcripts were analysed following a thematic analysis approach.
Twenty-eight playgroup parents, coordinators or peer facilitators participated in one of 8 focus groups or 5 interviews. Four themes were developed: Program strengths and challenges; Setting strengths and challenges; Factors that impact program delivery; Participant's suggestions for future program delivery.
The Healthy Conversations @ Playgroup program was valued by parents, providing validation and normalisation of parenting practices, and fostering a shared experience of parenting. Playgroups are a convenient setting for families to attend. The dynamic and distracting nature of the playgroup setting were carefully considered when designing the program. Strategies to further enhance program engagement could include use of coordinator or parent champions, tailored delivery, and extending the reach to other family members.
Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry ACTRN12621000055808, registered 22 January 2021, https://www.anzctr.org.au/Trial/Registration/TrialReview.aspx?id=380890.
Details
- Title
- A great way to bring up health behaviour topics at playgroup: a qualitative evaluation of the Healthy Conversations @ Playgroup program
- Authors
- Georgia Middleton - Flinders UniversityBrittany J Johnson (Corresponding Author) - Flinders UniversityDimity Dutch - Flinders UniversityStewart G Trost - The University of QueenslandRebecca Byrne - Queensland University of TechnologyHayley E Christian - The Kids Research Institute AustraliaAnna Henry - The Kids Research Institute AustraliaCaroline O Terranova - Queensland University of TechnologyKate E Williams - Queensland University of TechnologyLi Kheng Chai - Queensland University of TechnologyDenise S K Brookes - Queensland University of TechnologyKate Simon - Queensland University of TechnologyRebecca K Golley - Flinders University
- Publication details
- BMC Public Health, Vol.24, pp.1-13
- Publisher
- BioMed Central Ltd.
- Date published
- 2024
- DOI
- 10.1186/s12889-024-17703-x
- ISSN
- 1471-2458
- PMID
- 38528500
- Copyright note
- This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.
- Data Availability
- The datasets generated and/or analysed during the current study are not publicly available due to the nature of the data, the conditions of ethics approval, and privacy concerns, but are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
- Grants
- Organisation Unit
- School of Education and Tertiary Access
- Language
- English
- Record Identifier
- 991011197702621
- Output Type
- Journal article
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