Evaluation of Health 200 - Wellness Lifestyles: Can a University General Education Course in Wellness Lifestyles Enhance Students' Behaviors, Attitudes and Knowledge Regarding Their Health?

The primary purpose of this study was to determine whether a required wellness course affected a change in the behaviors of college students. A post-course evaluation, which examined the relation between attitude, knowledge, and behavior, was conducted six months following the completion of the course. A secondary purpose of the research was to solicit information from participating students concerning which portions of the course they felt benefited them and those that did not. This was done to identify potential problems within the course in order to make improvements on content and structure.

A survey was mailed six months after the completion of the course to 110 students who were enrolled in Health 200 Wellness Lifestyles in the 1997 spring semester at Radford University. Forty-five responses were returned for a return rate of 41%.

An analysis of self-reported data discloses that student behaviors improved from before taking Health 200 to six months after completing the course in all behavior categories with the exception of alcohol consumption. A paired t test, which was conducted to compare knowledge between the end of the semester and the post-test, indicated a significant loss of knowledge at a p level of <.05. Results from a simple linear regression analysis revealed that 17.46% of the variability in behavior was attributed to attitude.

Information gathered from the survey helped identify strengths and weaknesses of the course, which became instrumental in proposing recommendations for making course improvements.