Abstract :
As seen by the increasing rates of obesity around the world, most people find it difficult to maintain a healthy weight. The study aimed to identify the efficacy of an educational program, founded on a health belief model on employees' beliefs related to weight control. True experimental design by using the randomized controlled trial is conducted to determine the efficacy of the HBM in enhancing weight control beliefs among employees in the university of Mosul from (6 January to 1 June). The instrument of the study consists of (7) components include perceived susceptibility, perceived severity, perceived barrier, perceived benefits, perceived cue to action, perceived self-efficacy in dieting and exercise, and behavioural intention of weight control. The data is collected from employees by interview technique. The data was analysed by descriptive statistical. The study results indicated that the mean of HBM components in the pre-test for the study group includes: perceived severity (2.47), perceived susceptibility (2.51), Perceived Barriers (3.28), perceived benefits (2.41), cues to action (2.24), Self-efficacy (2.22), and (2.78) behavioural intention of weight control. While the post-test 2 showed the mean of HBM components are: perceived severity (3.24), perceived susceptibility (3.33), perceived barriers (3.24), perceived benefits (3.45), cause to action (3.31), perceived self-efficacy (3.09), and behavioural intention for weight control (3.76). The study concluded that the application of educational programs based on the health beliefs model can contribute significantly to a positive change in the beliefs of employees who suffer from obesity and overweight. The researcher recommended that the routine survey for obesity, dieting, and other weight-loss strategies should be a component of all health-care providers' continuous health-care services. The benefits and barriers of modifying health behavior should also be considered, according to HBM, because people who observe further benefits than barriers are further inclined to take act.
