A analysis of home economics education and nutrition programs determining their orientation toward the mission of home economics

The purpose of this study was to examine baccalaureate programs in home economics education and nutrition to determine if they are in adherence to the philosophy of home economics. The sample of this study was drawn from faculty from the 50 home economics education programs with the greatest number of baccalaureate graduates in their states and from the 50 nutrition programs with the greatest number of baccalaureate graduates in their states.;Two research questions were set forth for this survey. The first sought to determine the educational backgrounds which faculty teaching nutrition and those teaching home economics education bring to their teaching responsibilities. The second concerned whether nutrition and home economics education undergraduate programs were addressing the three systems of action (technical, communicative, emancipative) in degree-granting institutions.;The demographic variables were analyzed and compared between the home economics education faculty and the nutrition faculty respondents. The results indicated that the academic ranks of the two faculties did not differ significantly. The years of full-time teaching experience of the two faculties were similar. The primary academic responsibilities of the two faculties did not differ significantly. The two faculties did not differ in the major of their earned degrees at the bachelors, master's or doctoral levels.;The result of analyzing data from home economics education and nutrition faculty indicated that the majority of faculty in both programs responded positively to the question, "Do you apply the three systems of action to your undergraduate program?" Additional analysis of data indicated that the technical subscale items were more fully adopted than those of the communicative subscale, with the items of the emancipative subscale receiving the lowest rating of adoption. A difference was found between home economics education and nutrition faculties in their adoption of the emancipative subscale with home economics education faculty showing greater adherence to the philosophy of home economics than nutrition faculty.