Child-eating behaviour as predictor of anthropometric status of preschool children aged 2–4 years in Umuahia South LGA Abia State, Nigeria

Abstract Introduction and objective Eating behaviour at the childhood level plays a vital role in the outcome of the nutritional status and the overall health of an individual. The study was focused on the association between anthropometric status and child eating behaviour. Methodology A community-based cross-sectional survey purposively enrolled consenting participants from 256 households with preschool children aged 2–4 years. The parents/legal guardians were interviewed on the eating behaviour of their children using a validated semi-structured child-eating behaviour scale, and anthropometric measurement of the children were taken. WHO Anthro-software for child growth standards was used to categorize anthropometric status of the preschool children. Paired sample t-test was performed to compare child-eating behaviour by gender, while regression and correlation analysis was performed to determine the extent to which child-eating behaviour predicted anthropometric status at 5% level of significance. Results Mean comparison of child eating behaviour by gender showed significant difference (P < 0.05) between male and female children in their eating behaviour with respect to enjoyment of food and satiety responsiveness. Some of the children were wasted (26.6%), stunted (20.7%) and underweight (16.4%). A significant association (P < 0.05) was observed between body mass index-for-age and food fussiness behaviour of the children. There was also a significant difference (P < 0.05) between weight-for-age and food fussiness behaviour of the children. Conclusion The study showed that child eating behaviour may have contributed to the anthropometric status of the children, however, differences in their eating behaviours by gender was observed

Edible mushrooms as a novel protein source for functional foods

Fast demographic growth has led to an increasing interest in low-cost alternative protein sources to meet population needs. Consequently, the attention of many researchers has focused on finding under-exploited sources of protein, alternative to those of animal origin, usually plant proteins have been used for this purpose, however, most of them are not considered high quality proteins due to their lack of some essential amino acids. Mushroom proteins usually have a complete essential amino acid profile which may cover the dietetic requirements as well as they may have certain economic advantages compared to animal and plant sources since many mushrooms have the ability to grow in agro-industrial waste as well as on submerged cultures reaching high yields in a short period of time. Edible mushrooms can be processed to obtain a wide variety of food products enriched with high quality protein, which may have as well improved functional properties, giving them an added value.This work was supported by the National Council of Science and Technology (CONACYT). This study was also supported by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology under the scope of the strategic funding of UID/BIO/04469/2019 unit and BioTecNorte operation (NORTE-01-0145-FEDER-000004) funded by the European Regional Development Fund under the scope of Norte2020 - Programa Operacional Regional do Norte also, Project ColOsH 02/SAICT/2017 (POCI-01-0145-FEDER-030071)info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio