IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v19y2022i10p5884-d813902.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Emotions, Strategies, and Health: Examining the Impact of an Educational Program on Tanzanian Preschool Children

Author

Listed:
  • Lauren E. Kauffman

    (Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, USA)

  • Elizabeth A. Dura

    (Department of International Health, Bloomberg School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA)

  • Dina L. G. Borzekowski

    (Department of Behavioral and Community Health, School of Public Health, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, USA)

Abstract

Around the world, well-produced television programming can engage vulnerable, hard-to-reach audiences by offering informal education and enrichment. Akili and Me is an animated children’s educational program available in Sub-Saharan Africa that provides age and culturally appropriate lessons. In 2018, the producers created socio-emotional and health content. This study examines the relationship between children’s exposure to the new Akili and Me content and socio-emotional and health outcomes. Participants included low-income school children (mean age 5.32 years, SD = 0.82) from Arusha, Tanzania. Researchers conducted one-on-one baseline and post-intervention surveys with each participant. Over 12 weeks, the children attended afterschool sessions with screenings of Akili and Me, with distinct content screened on different days. The research team recorded children’s attendance and assessed children’s receptivity to the program through character identification. Using MLM regression models with data from 411 participants from 10 public schools, the analyses showed that a greater exposure and receptivity to Akili and Me predicted improved outcomes scores on the socio-emotional and health outcomes, controlling for sex, age, baseline scores, and general media receptivity (non- Akili and Me characters). Contributing to the literature on educational media, this study shows that exposure to an animated program can teach vulnerable preschool children socio-emotional and health content.

Suggested Citation

  • Lauren E. Kauffman & Elizabeth A. Dura & Dina L. G. Borzekowski, 2022. "Emotions, Strategies, and Health: Examining the Impact of an Educational Program on Tanzanian Preschool Children," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(10), pages 1-13, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:19:y:2022:i:10:p:5884-:d:813902
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/10/5884/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/10/5884/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Melissa S. Kearney & Phillip B. Levine, 2015. "Early Childhood Education by MOOC: Lessons from Sesame Street," NBER Working Papers 21229, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Alderman, Harold & Headey, Derek D., 2017. "How Important is Parental Education for Child Nutrition?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 448-464.
    3. Angelo Pietrobelli & Massimo Agosti & The MeNu Group, 2017. "Nutrition in the First 1000 Days: Ten Practices to Minimize Obesity Emerging from Published Science," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 14(12), pages 1-14, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Derek Headey & David Stifel & Liangzhi You & Zhe Guo, 2018. "Remoteness, urbanization, and child nutrition in sub‐Saharan Africa," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 49(6), pages 765-775, November.
    2. Sukhwinder Singh & Andrew D. Jones & Ruth S. DeFries & Meha Jain, 2020. "The association between crop and income diversity and farmer intra-household dietary diversity in India," Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, Springer;The International Society for Plant Pathology, vol. 12(2), pages 369-390, April.
    3. Elder Garcia Varela & Jamie Zeldman & Amy R. Mobley, 2022. "Community Stakeholders’ Perceptions on Barriers and Facilitators to Food Security of Families with Children under Three Years before and during COVID-19," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(17), pages 1-15, August.
    4. Manamboba Mitélama BALAKA & Koffi YOVO, 2022. "Changement climatique et nutrition infantile au Togo," Region et Developpement, Region et Developpement, LEAD, Universite du Sud - Toulon Var, vol. 56, pages 111-131.
    5. Mike Zabek, 2024. "Local Ties in Spatial Equilibrium," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 16(2), pages 287-317, April.
    6. Eliana La Ferrara, 2016. "Mass Media And Social Change: Can We Use Television To Fight Poverty?," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 14(4), pages 791-827, August.
    7. Gülcan Bektas & Femke Boelsma & Vivianne E. Baur & Jacob C. Seidell & S. Coosje Dijkstra, 2020. "Parental Perspectives and Experiences in Relation to Lifestyle-Related Practices in the First Two Years of a Child’s Life: A Qualitative Study in a Disadvantaged Neighborhood in The Netherlands," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(16), pages 1-17, August.
    8. Melanie Guldi & Amelia Hawkins & Jeffrey Hemmeter & Lucie Schmidt, 2018. "Supplemental Security Income and Child Outcomes: Evidence from Birth Weight Eligibility Cutoffs," NBER Working Papers 24913, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Milbank, Charlotte, 2023. "Associating dietary quality and forest cover in India," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 156(C).
    10. Derek Headey & Kalle Hirvonen & John Hoddinott, 2018. "Animal Sourced Foods and Child Stunting," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 100(5), pages 1302-1319.
    11. Kaplan, Andreas M. & Haenlein, Michael, 2016. "Higher education and the digital revolution: About MOOCs, SPOCs, social media, and the Cookie Monster," Business Horizons, Elsevier, vol. 59(4), pages 441-450.
    12. Stefano DellaVigna & Eliana La Ferrara, 2015. "Economic and Social Impacts of the Media," NBER Working Papers 21360, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Adediran, Olanrewaju Adewole, 2024. "The effect of women's decision-making on child nutritional outcomes in South Africa," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 53(C).
    14. Aysıt Tansel & Deniz Karaoğlan, 2019. "The Effect of Education on Health Behaviors and Obesity in Turkey: Instrumental Variable Estimates from a Developing Country," The European Journal of Development Research, Palgrave Macmillan;European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes (EADI), vol. 31(5), pages 1416-1448, December.
    15. Skoufias,Emmanuel & Vinha,Katja Pauliina, 2020. "Child Stature, Maternal Education, and Early Childhood Development," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9396, The World Bank.
    16. Yue Zhang & Xiaodong Zheng, 2022. "Internal migration and child health: An investigation of health disparities between migrant children and left-behind children in China," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 17(3), pages 1-15, March.
    17. Le, Kien & Nguyen, My, 2020. "Shedding light on maternal education and child health in developing countries," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 133(C).
    18. Headey, Derek & Hirvonen, Kalle & Hoddinott, John, 2017. "Animal sourced foods and child stunting: Evidence from 112,887 children in 46 countries," 2018 Allied Social Sciences Association (ASSA) Annual Meeting, January 5-7, 2018, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 264958, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    19. Le, Kien & Nguyen, My, 2020. "The Impacts of Armed Conflict on Child Health: Evidence from 56 Developing Countries," MPRA Paper 109896, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    20. Suman Chakrabarti & Samuel P. Scott & Harold Alderman & Purnima Menon & Daniel O. Gilligan, 2021. "Intergenerational nutrition benefits of India’s national school feeding program," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 12(1), pages 1-10, December.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:19:y:2022:i:10:p:5884-:d:813902. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.