COMMUNICATION EFFECTIVENESS OF POSTNATAL NUTRITION EDUCATION IN A WICPROGRAM

This article describes the results from a qualitative formative evalua tion of postnatal education efforts in a Los Angeles Women, Infants, a nd Children (WIC) program. The evaluation was conducted at 10 WIC clin ics where 15 focus group interviews were held. In addition, educationa l materials used for postnatal clients were analyzed for content. McGu ire's information processing model was used to compare content of mate rials with comprehension, retention, and yielding of the WIC participa nts. Our findings revealed that (1) complex and technical messages wer e not adequately processed by clients; (2) significantly fewer message s were retained than were delivered; (3) regardless of the high volume of message delivery, clients tended to retain approximately four key messages from each session; and (4) there appeared to be little differ ence in retention between informational, behavioral, and attitudinal m essages. Based on our findings, we conclude that in order to attain op timal retention, the message structure of educational sessions should contain fewer and less complex messages.