Abstract:
The purpose of the study was to investigate Child Weaning Practices among Nursing
Mothers in Suhum Municipality in the Eastern Region of Ghana. In line with the aim
of the study, the objectives were to find out weaning foods mothers in Suhum give to
their infants after 6 - 24 months, identify factors that influence the choice of weaning
foods in Suhum, find out how mothers feed their infants with weaning foods and to
find out mothers challenges during the weaning period, using the descriptive research
design. Purposive and convenience sampling techniques were used to sample a total
of sixty nine (69) respondents. Structured interview guide data gathering tools was
used to document the findings. The instrument was pilot tested at the Kibi
Government hospital in the Eastern Region of Ghana. The instrument was validated
by two of my colleagues and my supervisor. After that it was pretested using five
mothers, the Cronbach alpha yielded 0.732, showing reliability of the instrument. The
University of Education,Winneba http://ir.uew.edu.gh
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Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) version 20 was used for the analysis.
Statistics included mean, frequencies, percentages and standard deviations. Based on
the research questions, the frequency tables were used to make summaries of
respondents‘ responses and for drawing conclusions. The study revealed that weaning
foods mothers in Suhum give to their infants are locally prepared dishes that the
whole family eats. During feeding, these foods are mashed with fingers before given
to them. It was also discovered that the factors that influence mothers‘ choice are
availability and acceptability of food. Some challenges were that infants refuse to eat,
cry, vomit, experience diarrhoea, and sometimes allergy. It was recommended that
mothers should prepare weaning foods separately to meet the standard of infants and
feed them 5 – 6 times in a day, also select weaning foods based on acceptability of the
child.
Description:
A thesis in the Department of Home Economics Education, Faculty of Science
Education, submitted to the School of Graduate Studies, in partial fulfilment
of the requirements for the award of degree of
Master of Philosophy
(Home Economics Education)
in the University of Education, Winneba
