Influence of Attitude Toward Behavior and Subjective Norms in Predicting Intention to Provide Healthy Foods on Child Stunting Under Five Years Old

The immadiate cause of child stunting under five years old was lack of food intake and infectious disease⁽³⁾. Providing healthy food on child stunting has been shown to influence the growth of body height⁽¹⁾. This study aims to determine the effect of attitudes toward behavior and subjective norms in predicting intention of caregivers to provide healthy foods on child stunting under five years old. This research was an observational analytic with cross sectional design. The study was conducted on 137 caregivers of child stunting under five years old in Tuban District. Data were collected by interviews using questionnaires.

Data analysis was using cross tabulation to know the frequency of behavioral beliefs, evaluation of behavioral outcomes, attitude toward behavior, normative beliefs, motivation to comply, subjective norms, and intention to provide healthy food on child stunting under five years old. Then data analysis using logistic regression to know the influence of attitude toward behavior and subjective norms in forming intention to give healthy feeding on child stunting under five years old.

The results obtained that most of caregivers have supportive attitude toward behavior, strong behavioral beliefs, strong evaluation of behavioral outcomes, weak subjective norms, weak normative beliefs, strong motivation to comply, and strong intention. Attitude toward behavior has strong influence on intention forming to provide healthy foods. Meanwhile, the subjective norms has no effect on the intention forming to provide healthy foods. Attitude toward behavior was the strongest predictor in forming intention to provide healthy foods on child stunting under five years old. Recommendation of this research was to provide counseling on the social environment of caregivers, especially to grandmother related to nutrition and child stunting.