Franken, Saskia

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Last updated April 28, 2025
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Saskia is an Aruban researcher and educator. Her interests span health-related behavior, peer influence, health promotion, marketing, branding, and consumer behavior. These interests are shaped by her external PhD candidate trajectory at the Erasmus School of Social and Behavioural Sciences at Erasmus University Rotterdam, located in the Netherlands; her position as a Marketing lecturer at the Faculty of Accounting, Finance, and Marketing at the University of Aruba; and her educational background consisting of a Master of Science in Business Administration with a specialization in Marketing, and a Bachelor of Business and Management in Marketing with a focus on International Management. Saskia’s current research project focuses on using children’s peer influence within social networks at schools to promote water drinking behaviors.

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Now showing 1 - 5 of 5
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    UA Research & Expertise - Saskia Franken
    (2024) Franken, Saskia
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    UARC Dialogue session: Interdisciplinary research at the UA April 22, 2025
    (University of Aruba, Research Center, 2025-04-22) Laclé, Francis; van Donselaar, Bart; Franken, Saskia
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    Promoting water consumption among children through a social network intervention: a cluster randomized controlled trial on a Caribbean island
    (2025-01-16) Franken, Saskia; Smit, Crystal R.; de Moor, Marleen H. M.; de Leeuw, Rebecca N. H.; Franken, Saskia
    This study examined the effect of the evidence-based adapted social network intervention named Kies Awa (translation: Choose Water) on children’s water and sugar-sweetened beverages (SSB) consumption. It also examined the moderating role of children’s descriptive and injunctive norms of water and SSB consumption on the intervention’s effect. Subject and methods: We conducted a cluster randomized control trial (RCT) where schools were randomized to one of two clusters: the intervention group (IG; Kies Awa intervention; 156 participants; M = 11.08, SD = 1.00; 53.8% girls) or the control group (CG; no intervention; 144 participants; M = 11.32, SD = 0.96; 52.8% girls). The primary outcome measure was water consumption and the secondary outcome was SSB consumption. Results: Linear mixed modeling analyses showed that water consumption increased significantly more among IG participants than in the CG (β = 0.141; p = 0.015). The effect on SSB consumption was moderated by perceived injunctive norms, which refer to social disapproval of consuming SSBs. Specifically, the intervention reduced SSB consumption for participants reporting high levels of injunctive norms (β = -0.052; p = 0.037). Conclusion: These findings suggest that Kies Awa, an evidence-based adapted intervention, could be implemented in other Caribbean islands to improve children’s water consumption. This approach could be integrated into school health programs, contributing to public health. These findings may help achieve the United Nations’ goal of ensuring healthy lives for all children, even in under-researched world regions. Clinical Trail Registration: Main ID number: NL-OMON26157, preregistration date 2018-12-20. https:// trial search. who. int/ Trial2. aspx? Trial ID= NL- OMON2 6157.
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    Promoting Water Consumption on a Caribbean Island: An Intervention Using Children’s Social Networks at Schools
    (MDPI, 2018) Franken, Saskia; Smit, Crystal R.; Buijzen, Moniek
    Sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) consumption and the associated childhood obesity are major concerns in the Caribbean, creating a need for interventions promoting water consumption as a healthy alternative. A social network-based intervention (SNI) was tested among Aruban children to increase their water consumption and behavioral intention to do so and, consequently, to decrease SSB consumption and the associated behavioral intention. In this study, the moderating effects of descriptive and injunctive norms were tested. A cluster randomized controlled trial was completed in schools (mean age = 11 years ± SD = 0.98; 54% girls). Children were assigned to the intervention group (IG; n = 192) or control group (CG; n = 185). IG children were exposed to peer influencers promoting water consumption and CG children were not. Regression analyses showed that water consumption increased for IG children with a high injunctive norm score (p = 0.05); however, their intention to consume more water remained unchanged (p = 0.42). Moreover, IG children showed a decrease in SSB consumption (p = 0.04) and an increase in their intention to consume less SSB (p = 0.00). These findings indicate that SNIs are a promising instrument for health behavioral changes for Aruba and other islands in the Caribbean region.
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    Understanding the behavioral determinants of adolescents’ water consumption: A cross-country comparative study
    (ScienceDirect, 2023) Franken, Saskia; Smit, Crystal R.; de Leeuw, Rebecca N. H.; van Woudenberg, Thabo J.; Burk, William J.; Bevelander, Kirsten E.; Buijzen, Moniek
    Substituting the consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSB) with that of water can have a positive effect on adolescents’ health. However, despite the attention on this topic in the Global North, it is relatively understudied in other regions of the world, such as the Caribbean. To guide the development of future interventions, understanding the factors determining water consumption among Caribbean adolescents is important. This study examined the behavioral determinants of water consumption among adolescents in Aruba (the Caribbean) and compared them to those in the Netherlands (Western Europe). We used a theoretical model that integrates the dominant theoretical perspectives in the field of public health, including theories of planned behavior, social norms, and intrinsic motivation. This crosscountry study included 1,584 adolescents from Aruba and the Netherlands (52% girls; M = 12.34 years; SD = 2.14). The data were analyzed using regression analyses. This study found that in Aruba, adolescents with higher scores of intrinsic motivation, friends’ descriptive norms, attitudes, and behavioral control regarding water consumption drank more water. Moreover, the associations between water consumption and both intrinsic motivation as well as friends’ descriptive norms for adolescents in Aruba were stronger than those found in the Netherlands. These associations imply that it is even more important for Aruban adolescents than Dutch adolescents to be intrinsically motivated or to perceive their friends often consuming water to drink more water. The cross-country comparison implies that future interventions in Aruba aimed at increasing adolescents’ water consumption as an alternative to SSB should focus on enhancing their intrinsic motivation while considering their friends’ social norms.