The Impact of School Snacks on Cognitive Function of Primary School Children in Egypt
Abstract: Background: Hunger and malnutrition among children in developing countries continue to impair health and cognitive development. School feeding is supposed to eliminate hunger of school age children improving
their health, education and future productivity as adults. Objective: to assess the short and long-term effects of school feeding programme (SFP) on cognitive function of Egyptian primary school children after five years of its implementation.
Methods: The intervention group consisted of 903 pupils in the 5th grade chosen randomly from schools have taken school meal for five years. The control group was 886 age and sex-matched pupils chosen randomly from schools have never taken school meal. The snack consists of a pie fortified with minerals and vitamins. Assessment of nutritional status, socio-demographic variables and dietary behaviour was performed. A battery of neuropsychological tests was employed.
Results: Children, who have got school meal for five years, have better visual memory (Free recall & categorization) and auditory attention (Auditory vigilance) than the control group. On the other hand, they got lower scores in testing speed of information processing (Coding test) and short-term working memory (digit span) than their counterparts. The intervention group outperformed the control group on tests of attention and working memory in the afternoon assessment. Multiple regression analysis presents school meal as the main predictor of visual memory and auditory attention, while socioeconomic variables are the main predictors of high cognitive function.
Conclusion: School snack has the opportunity to alleviate short-term hunger during the school day. Providing students with important micronutrients especially iron, regularly through daily intake of school snacks, results in improvement in specific cognitive functions. School meal should be one of multiple interventions designed to improve the
environment in which poor children live and learn.
Key words: School meal, cognition, attention, memory, disadvantaged children, micronutrients.
Publication year 2012
Pages 5639-5650
Organization Name
serial title Journal of Applied Sciences Research
Author(s) from ARC
Publication Type Journal
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