Mothers Knowledge on Domains of Child Development

Background: Child development refers to the biological, psychological and emotional changes that occur in human beings between birth and the end of adolescence, as the individual progresses from dependency to increasing autonomy.

Objectives: The objectives of the study were to assess the knowledge of mothers regarding the domains of child development and to find the association between the knowledge scores of mothers and selected variables like age, education, monthly income, type of family, area of living and source of information.

Method: A descriptive survey approach was used .Data was collected from 144 mothers by administering the questionnaire on domains of child development and demographic proforma. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyse the data.

Results: Among the 144 mothers, majority (74%) had average knowledge regarding domains of child development and the mean percentage score was maximum (53.63%) in the area related to moral development. A significant association was found between knowledge and age of the mother (χ2=9.704, P=.032).

Conclusion: The finding gives an insight for nurses to develop better education and parenting training programs for mothers to bridge the gap in the knowledge child development.