This Australian study published in the Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior reveals the dual response of parents, passive or "too" active, when faced with their child's feeding difficulties. While this type of behavior and difficulty eating or tasting certain foods is a normal and transitory phase in the development of a child's eating habits and tastes, it can be stressful for parents. This worry sometimes prompts mothers and fathers to resort to pressure or rewards to make the child eat.
But instead of "helping" the child develop their own nutritional balance, these practices can reinforce bad habits, increase preferences for unhealthy foods and lead to excessive weight gain, says lead author Holly Harris, from the Center for Children's Health Research at the Queensland University of Technology (Brisbane).
This study conducted among 208 mothers and fathers with children aged 2 to 5 years, who are rather socioeconomically disadvantaged, confirms the harmful effects of this type of parental reaction. The researchers asked the parents to assess their responsibility for their child's diet and temperament and to provide information on the frequency of difficult eating behaviors as well as their reactions to these behaviors. In particular, parents had to answer questions such as: “When your child refuses the food he usually eats, do you insist? Do you encourage him with a reward other than food?… This survey reveals that:
- mothers are generally more concerned about these difficult eating behaviors;
- mothers feel more responsible for their child's food and nutrition;
- mothers are also more sensitive to the child's verbal and non-verbal signals and therefore more distressed by their crying, tantrums or yawning when the child refuses to eat. This significant emotional burden for mothers induces them to remain more passive in the face of these feeding difficulties, sometimes to the detriment of the child's nutritional balance;
- Faced with the same difficulties, fathers more frequently attempt persuasion, by pressure or by reward. But not for the sake of playing the role of parent but rather for practical reasons such as finishing the meal after a long day at work.
In short, the authors emphasize that there is a huge need for education of parents on food and eating behavior of children. Educational interventions that will also have to deal with the underlying causes of these parental practices that are poorly adapted to the needs of the child.
Beyond the indisputable economic barriers to access to fresh food, health and early childhood professionals therefore have a key role to play in promoting, via parents, children's exposure to a wide variety of healthy food.