“Assess the Knowledge and Attitude of Parents on needs of Play for Children with a View to Develop an Information Booklet.”

Sheuli Sen 1 and Rashmi 2 . 1. Professor, Amity College of Nursing, Amity University, Gurgaon. 2. Assistant Professor, Amity College of Nursing, Amity University, Gurgaon. ...................................................................................................................... Manuscript Info Abstract ......................... ........................................................................ Manuscript History

Play is a voluntary, intrinsically motivated activity normally associated with recreational pleasure and enjoyment. It is a serious business to children and a vehicle for development. Through the universal medium of play, children learn what no one can teach them. They learn about their world and how to deal with this environment of objects, time, space, structure, and people. As children grow and mature, play changes in form of type, to fit into the complex needs of the growing child. The purpose of the study was to develop an Information Booklet based on parental knowledge and attitude on needs of play for children thereby improving parental knowledge and attitude and to provide a favorable environment for their normal growth and development. The study was conducted to assess the knowledge and attitude of parents on needs of play for children in a selected hospital of Kolkata, West Bengal with a view to develop an Information Booklet. A nonexperimental survey approach with descriptive research design was adopted for the study. The data were collected using convenience sampling technique among 80 parents whose children were admitted in the hospital for treatment. The collected data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics. Findings revealed that out of 80 parents more than half (58%) had good knowledge level on needs of play for children. Most of them (91%) had positive attitude where score range was from 41-60. There was no significant association of knowledge with selected variables. And also there was no significant association of attitude with selected variables and the computed "r" value was -0.183 which revealed that there was a weak negative relationship between knowledge and attitude on needs of play for children. Reliability:-Reliability of structured knowledge questionnaire was calculated using Split Half technique followed by Spearman Brown prophecy formula and the reliability coefficient was found r = 0.86; so it can be interpreted that structured knowledge questionnaire was reliable and had internal consistency. To test the reliability for attitude scale; Cronbach"s alfa formula was used to check the internal consistency. The reliability was found to be r = 0.80, so attitude scale was also considered reliable.

Study findings:-
The data were presented under the following section-Section I: Description of sample characteristics. Section II: Knowledge score of parents on needs of play.

2096
Section III: Attitude of parents on needs of play. Section IV: Association of knowledge with selected demographic variables. Section V: Association of attitude with selected demographic variables. Section VI: Relationship between knowledge and attitude.
Section I; Description of sample characteristics: Data shows that out of 80 parents 53(66.25%) were within the age group of 21-30years, whereas only 13(16%) were below 20 years. The data also showed that most of the parents77 (96.25%) were mothers and only 3(l3.75%) were fathers. The tabulated data indicated that out of 80 parents 37(46.25%) had one child, 41.25% had two children and 12.5% had more than two children. Data revealed that half of the parents 40(50%) educational standard was secondary and higher secondary, whereas only 8.75% were illiterate. Data also revealed that more than half of the parents 53(66.25%) were unemployed, few parents 18(22.5%) were self-employed and very few 9(11.25%) were employed in private sector. Majority of the parents 56(70%) had nuclear family, few of them 22(27.5%) had joint family and very few 2(2.5%) had extended family. data also revealed that most parents 68(85%) had family income less than Rs 10,000 per month. Most of the parents 71(88.75%) had no exposure to health related information and only few parents 9(11.25%) had exposure to health related information.
Section II; Knowledge score of parents on needs of play:-Data presented in Figure represents knowledge level of parents on needs of play. Out of 80 parents more than half of them (58%) had good knowledge level and 36% of them had satisfactory knowledge level and very few of them (6%) had very good knowledge level.

Area of knowledge:-
Knowledge on needs of play for children was organized under five sub headings and area that include: Meaning of Play, Types of Play, Selection of play and toy safety, Benefits of play, and Needs of play.
Above Figure represents:-area wise mean percentage distribution of knowledge score of 80 parents. The figure-4indicated that mean percentage of knowledge score was more than 50% in the first three areas, area11, area 2 and area 3 respectively. Data also revealed that mean percentage of knowledge score was less than 50% in area 4 and area 5 respectively.

SECTION-III Sample distribution based on attitude on needs of play
Data presented in the table-5 showed the distribution of attitude score of 80 parents on needs of play for children. In the attitude score minimum possible score was 20 and maximum possible score was 80. The tabulated data indicated that parents attitude score was distributed from 39 -65. It was also observed that out of 80 parents 12.5%, 20% and 30% of scored in the range 48-50, 51-53 and 54-56.

2097
Further results in this section shows that parents had knowledge score range, mean, median and standard deviation was 64 -41, 53.2, 54.06 and 5.3 respectively. Data indicated that mean and median was very close and attitude score was highly dispersed. Results shows that out of 80 parents, most of them (91%) had positive attitude, very few (9%) had strong positive attitude and no one had negative or strong negative attitude.

SECTION-IV Association of knowledge level with selected demographic variables
Data showed the result of Chi square on the association of knowledge level with selected demographic variablesage, gender, educational status, occupation, family income and health related information. The obtained Chi value (0.93), (0.007), (1.47), (0.36), (0.379) and (0.076) is lesser than the table value for the variable-age, gender, educational status, occupation and health related information and are not significant at 0.05 level of significance.
The result shows that parents" knowledge is independent of selected variables age, gender, educational status, occupation, family income and health related information.

SECTION-V Association of attitude with selected demographic variables
Data presented in The result shows that parents attitude on needs of play is independent of selected variables age, gender, number of children, educational status, occupation, family income and type of family.

SECTION-VI :-Relationship between knowledge and attitude of parents on needs of play
Data shows that the obtained "r" value (-0.183) was significantly lower than the table value (t79=0.217 at 0.05 level of significance). Therefore, researcher fail to reject the null hypothesis and infer that there was a weak negative relationship between knowledge and attitude of parents on needs of play.

Limitations:-
 No attempt was made to do follow up to measure the retention of knowledge of parents on needs of play for children.  Sample size was small which limits generalization to larger population with samples with similar characteristics.  Extrenous variables were beyond the investigators control.

Recommendations:-
On the basis of findings, the following recommendations are offered for future research:  A similar study can be done in community settings.  A similar study can be repeated by using a larger sample to avoid type II error and for generalisation.  A comparative study can be done in private and Govt. hospital settings.  Experimental study can be done to find the effectiveness of Planned Teaching Programme on needs of play for children.  An exploratory study can be done to identify parental perception on needs of play for children.

Conclusion:-
The following conclusion can be drawn based on the study that-Parents had more than 50% of knowledge level on needs of play of children. Most of them had positive attitude. There was no significant association of knowledge with selected variables. And also there was no significant association of attitude with selected variables and there was a weak negative relationship between knowledge and attitude on needs of play for children.