Promoting Healthful Eating Behaviors: Family Influence

Family behaviors influence a preschooler's reaction to food and eating behavior. For instance, eating in front of the TV may become an expectation. Foods promoted as healthy and good may end up being disliked or avoided if parents don't eat the foods too. Offering rewards for eating certain food can make that food less desirable. Restricting intake of junk food favorites can generate interest in eating that food and decrease the child's ability to respond to satiety and stop eating. A better solution is to simply avoid purchasing the food on a regular basis.

As children age, controlling the home menu becomes more difficult, especially when children plunder accessible cupboards. Foods like fruit snacks, fruit bars, fruit drinks, puddings, and sweetened yogurts packed in individual serving sizes seem like an appropriate choice to young children. They assume these are "okay" snack foods meant for their intake and will passionately respond to parental restrictions. To win this battle parents must limit their purchases; however, when putting these foods "on the menu," parents should not restrict amounts.

Encourage parents to remain firm about what foods are "on the menu" for snacks or meals. Parents should predetermine menu choices; children may choose to eat, or not. But these menu wars might have their cease-fires: in the absence of a precluding medical condition, parents should include at least one food finicky children will eat.