The role of home economics in educating for holistic wellbeing : a review of research and practice in Malta in recent years

Abstract

Ever since its origins as a discipline, the primary aim of Home Economics has been to assist individuals and families make effective use of available resources for solving problems, maintaining wellbeing and ultimately improving their and their community's quality of life. This aim is still at the centre of all HE teaching, training and research and is also subscribed to by HE professionals in Malta. Behaviours such as dietary intake, physical activity and other lifestyle and consumption practices play a major role in influencing personal, family and community health in its broadest sense. Understanding what drives choices and practices and how they affect wellbeing are key challenges to society, as are developing effective ways to promote and foster responsible consumption behaviours among diverse learners, whether in formal education settings such as schools, or informal settings such as community groups. Throughout these past 40 years, since the launch of the Bachelor of Education programme, the University of Malta, Faculty of Education's Home Economics (HE)/Nutrition, Family and Consumer Studies (NFCS) lecturers and students have been actively researching just this, looking at personal behaviours, influencing factors and HE-based curricula and educational strategies. This paper presents a review of select research work conducted and supervised in the Maltese context by HE specialists. The studies which form the basis of this review were carried out over the past 15 years as HE-related doctoral theses, or as high quality Master's and Bachelor’s dissertations. The review is grouped into three different areas: 1) Research which identified status of behaviours among children, teenagers, youth and adults and then focused on influencing knowledge, attitudes, skills and other factors in the areas of food, nutrition and sustainability; 2) Evaluated class-based or community-based educational interventions with different population groups, looking at both content and pedagogy and the impact of the interventions; and 3) Research on HE curriculum, teacher training, class-based practice and support and links with policies and socio-cultural factors. This review of Maltese studies has served to bring out the complexity of food, health and consumption behaviours and the various influencing factors at different levels of the environment, the value of interventions based on theory and which are targeted to meet identified learners' needs, and how HE curricula and teacher training have developed in relation to contextual changes in society. The review has also shown that HE research can offer evidence in a variety of domains in order to inform curricular decisions in the area and to influence and advocate for effective policies and structures in education, health, family and consumer affairs among others. This is in line with the HE goal of nurturing individuals, families and communities to have the best possible level of wellbeing whether through individual actions for behaviour change, or through facilitative policies, services and environments HE programmes and research by the Faculty of Education can continue to have a significant role in this endeavour, locally and international.