Mother’s knowledge as a dominant factor for the success of exclusive breastfeeding in Indonesia

Introduction: Exclusive breastfeeding is one of the important indicators in achieving nutritional problems in children. Unfortunately, only 1 in 2 babies are exclusively breastfed in Indonesia. Therefore, this study aims to examine the factors associated with exclusive breastfeeding in the country. Design and Methods: Data were obtained from the Indonesian Family Life Survey (IFLS), by using a cross-sectional design involving a total of 2,217 mothers. The independent variables include weaning food, knowledge, labor difficulties, postpartum visits, number of children, marital status, sex of children, and low birth weight (LBW), while the dependent variable include exclusive breastfeeding. Subsequently, chi-square test and logistic regression were used to examine the relationship between exclusive breastfeeding and the related factors. Results: The prevalence of exclusive breastfeeding in Indonesia was 36.5%. Bivariate analysis showed that the variables associated with exclusive breastfeeding were weaning feeding, knowledge, low birth weight, and difficulty in labor with p-values of 0.005, 0.000, 0.040, and 0.005, respectively. The most dominant variable for exclusive breastfeeding behavior is knowledge with a value of OR = 1.85. Conclusions: There is a significant relationship between knowledge of mothers, weaning food, and low birth weight with exclusive breastfeeding behavior. Meanwhile, the main determinant among the variables is mother's knowledge. Therefore, health workers and community service cadres need to provide counseling about health, assistance, and motivation to mothers, thereby they will be able to properly provide exclusive breastfeeding.