Abstract

Mechanisms contributing to childhood obesity begin during early life, including infant feeding practices and an excessive rate of infant growth. Parental decisions regarding their infant contribute to these mechanisms. Parental self-efficacy (PSE) is the belief parents have in their ability to accomplish the tasks of parenting and is associated with infant outcomes. A high sense of PSE, breastfeeding self-efficacy, or self-efficacy for feeding has been found to be associated with healthy infant feeding practices. However, this research is limited in scope and has not been conducted in populations at greatest risk for childhood obesity such as low-income or African-American infants. Therefore, more research is needed to examine associations among PSE, infant feeding practices, and infant growth, particularly in high risk populations.

The purpose of this dissertation was to examine associations among PSE, infant feeding practices, and infant weight gain. This purpose was accomplished through three manuscripts. The first was an integrative review that examined associations among these concepts in diverse samples across the globe. Two additional studies were secondary analyses of the Infant Care, Feeding, and Risk of Obesity (Infant Care) dataset. These data were collected in low-income, African-American mother-infant dyads. The second manuscript focused on the association between PSE and infant feeding practices, and the third on the association between PSE and infant weight-for-length z-score (WLZ) trajectories.

Description

This dissertation has also been disseminated through the ProQuest Dissertations and Theses database. Dissertation/thesis number: 10830235; ProQuest document ID: 2103932904. The author still retains copyright.

Author Details

Jessica S. Bahorski, PhD, APRN, PPCNP-BC, WHNP-BC, Assistant Professor

Sigma Membership

Beta Pi

Lead Author Affiliation

Florida State University, Tallahassee, Florida, USA

Type

Dissertation

Format Type

Text-based Document

Study Design/Type

Descriptive/Correlational

Research Approach

Secondary Analysis

Keywords:

Infant Feeding Practices, Infant Weigh-for-Length z-scores, Parental Self-Efficacy, Infant Outcomes, Low-Income and/or African American Infants

Advisor

Gwendolyn D. Childs

Second Advisor

Lori A. Loan

Degree

PhD

Degree Grantor

The University of Alabama at Birmingham

Degree Year

2018

Rights Holder

All rights reserved by the author(s) and/or publisher(s) listed in this item record unless relinquished in whole or part by a rights notation or a Creative Commons License present in this item record.

All permission requests should be directed accordingly and not to the Sigma Repository.

All submitting authors or publishers have affirmed that when using material in their work where they do not own copyright, they have obtained permission of the copyright holder prior to submission and the rights holder has been acknowledged as necessary.

Review Type

None: Degree-based Submission

Acquisition

Proxy-submission

Date of Issue

2022-03-23

Full Text of Presentation

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