이유행태가 유아의 건강상태에 미치는 영향 - 서울 지역 유아를 대상으로 -

Effects of Weaning Behavior on Health Status of Infants in Seoul, Korea

This study was conducted to investigate the effects of weaning behavior on infants' health status. 294 mothers who had infants, aged 4 to 12 months in Seoul, were selected by cluster sampling and answered by the special questionnaires. Result were as follows : 55.1% of mothers had commenced weaning by 3 months of age. Infants eatten commercial weaning food except for infant eatten only home made weaning food were 88.8%. The case that mothers couldn't make weaning food at the home were 56.6% because they didn't know how to cook of weaning food. Cereals were used frequently as infant foods while meat and fish were lesser used. The higher mother's education level had, the higher nutritional knowledge had. Nutritional knowledge was not influenced on selecting the kinds of weaning food. But the higher nutritional knowledge had, the more desirable weaning behavior mother tended to be had. The more desirable weaning behavior mother had, the more infant's health status tended to be improved. Therefore, for the desirable weaning behaviors of mothers and the improvement of infants' health status, nutritional education program including cook method and development of infant food is need.