Browsing by Subject "ruokasuhde"

Childrens and adolescents relationship with food can be supported in various pedagogical methods. Previous research suggests that childrens and adolescents relationship with food can be supported by positive interaction and by emphasizing the pleasurable aspect of eating. The suggested approach can be understood with food and eating relationship framework. The framework is developed by Talvia and Anglé (2018), whose aim is to guide educators on how to fulfil the food and nutrition educational needs of putting the diverse relationship with food and eating into practice. In this study the food and eating relationship framework is applied to home economics teachers perceptions on supporting pupils’ relationship with food. The theoretical framework of this study is based on previous research of food education and attitudes towards food. Previous research takes place on the fields of nutritional science and home economics. A qualitative research was utilized in this study. The data consists of six virtual interviews of home economics teachers. Teachers expressions that are associated with supporting pupils’ relationship with food and eating were first separated from the data. The expressions were analysed and categorized with content analysis methods. The analysis yielded four main categories of which represent home economics teachers perceptions on how to support pupils’ relationship with food. The main categories are offering mental support for the pupil, utilizing positive pedagogy in teaching, creating a safe atmosphere in the learning environment and increasing pupils’ knowledge on the impacts of food and eating. In this study the home economics teachers experience that they can support pupils’ relationship with food in various pedagogical means. According to the results, home economics teachers find both teachers and peers contribution being a meaningful part of supporting pupils’ relationship with food. Both teachers and peers are expected to accept and allow different relationships with food and eating. The whole group is expected to offer mental support for peers and teachers find guiding pupils towards this as their task. Results suggest that home economics teachers find pedagogical skills even more important than home economics skills when the aim is to support pupils’ relationship with food and eating. Area for further research would be how the teachers pedagogical skills promote pupils’ relationship with food and eating.

The aim of the study was to find out how the subjects define and understand the concept of comfort food and the situations which comfort food is associated to. The goal was also to find out whether study participants find it actually comforting to eat comfort food. The purpose was also to describe and analyze how the meanings given to comfort food are attached to different aspects of the food relations framework as defined by Talvia and Anglé (2018). Previous comfort food studies have shown that the comfort food phenomenon is difficult to define because of its ambiguity and the subjective experience of every individual. The study was conducted as a qualitative study. The research material was collected using an electronic questionnaire. Electronic questionnaire was implemented with Google Forms -platform and it was shared on the Järvenpää Facebook group as well as on WhatsApp with my own contacts. A total of 109 people responded to the electronic questionnaire. From Google Forms the questionnaire responses were transferred to Excel for analysis. Research material was analyzed using content analysis. Participants in the study were familiar with the concept of comfort food as it was defined using words and terms similar to those in the previous comfort food studies. The situationality of comfort food appeared as taking care of the close ones, experiences of nostalgia and loneliness, reward, food and eating-related classification, at special moments and in a disturbed food relationship related situation. The responses of many study participants also indicated that they found the comfort food comforting. Based on the results, it can be stated that the emotions play a significant role in the context of comfort food. Comfort food is often associated with emotional eating, which deals with different emotions. Through the different components of the food relation framework it can be seen that comfort food is also related to an individual's general relationship to food.