Honors Program

[Honors-in-Discipline (Choose below)], Honors in Nutrition

Date of Award

5-2022

Thesis Professor(s)

Whitney Bignell

Thesis Professor Department

Rehabilitative Health Sciences

Thesis Reader(s)

Mary Andreae

Abstract

The importance of proper nutrition education among older adults is crucial in promoting overall physical health and management of chronic health conditions. However, access to such education has been limited, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. With the current boom in social media popularity, as well as virtual communication portals such as Zoom, the question must be asked if nutrition education could be effectively implemented for the use of older adults through these electronic channels. The study design for this particular research was a cross sectional survey to inform development of an online nutrition education program for older adults in Northeast Tennessee. (Appendix B). The survey was distributed as a paper-based survey in seven senior centers and as an online Qualtrics survey distributed by all senior center directors in Northeast Tennessee. A total of 160 surveys were collected (61 paper-based, 99 online), with 150 surveys being complete. Frequencies showed that the majority of participants have internet access and use social media platforms, such as Facebook and YouTube, which was not affected by home location, such as rural versus urban. Most participants were interested in participating in a nutrition education program. The survey also revealed more information about seniors in Northeast Tennessee that will be helpful when developing this program.

Publisher

East Tennessee State University

Document Type

Honors Thesis - Withheld

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

Copyright

Copyright by the authors.

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