Learning to Eat Vegetables in Early Life: The Role of Timing, Age and Individual Eating Traits

Vegetable intake is generally low among children, who appear to be especially fussy during the pre-school years. Repeated exposure is known to enhance intake of a novel vegetable in early life but individual differences in response to familiarisation have emerged from recent studies. In order to understand the factors which predict different responses to repeated exposure, data from the same experiment conducted in three groups of children from three countries (n = 332) aged 4–38 m (18.9±9.9 m) were combined and modelled. During the intervention period each child was given between 5 and 10 exposures to a novel vegetable (artichoke puree) in one of three versions (basic, sweet or added energy). Intake of basic artichoke puree was measured both before and after the exposure period. Overall, younger children consumed more artichoke than older children. Four distinct patterns of eating behaviour during the exposure period were defined. Most children were “learners” (40%) who increased intake over time. 21% consumed more than 75% of what was offered each time and were labelled “plate-clearers”. 16% were considered “non-eaters” eating less than 10 g by the 5th exposure and the remainder were classified as “others” (23%) since their pattern was highly variable. Age was a significant predictor of eating pattern, with older pre-school children more likely to be non-eaters. Plate-clearers had higher enjoyment of food and lower satiety responsiveness than non-eaters who scored highest on food fussiness. Children in the added energy condition showed the smallest change in intake over time, compared to those in the basic or sweetened artichoke condition. Clearly whilst repeated exposure familiarises children with a novel food, alternative strategies that focus on encouraging initial tastes of the target food might be needed for the fussier and older pre-school children

Developing healthy food preferences in preschool children through taste exposure, sensory learning and nutrition education

Purpose of Review: The present review was undertaken in order to summarize and evaluate recent research investigating taste exposure, sensory learning, and nutrition education interventions for promoting vegetable intake in preschool children. Recent Findings: Overall, taste exposure interventions yielded the best outcomes for increasing vegetable intake in early childhood. Evidence from sensory learning strategies such as visual exposure and experiential learning also show some success. While nutrition education remains the most common approach used in preschool settings, additional elements are needed to strengthen the educational program for increasing vegetable intake. There is a substantial gap in the evidence base to promote vegetable intake in food fussy children. Summary: The present review reveals the relative importance of different intervention strategies for promoting vegetable intake. To strengthen intervention effects for improving vegetable intake in preschool children, future research could consider integrating taste exposure and sensory learning strategies with nutrition education within the preschool curriculum

Persuading children: a framework for understanding long-lasting influences on children's food choices

Journal non répertorié dans les bases de données internationales.International audienceIn this paper, we present a framework for understanding long-lasting influences on children's food purchase choices and consumption. The framework interacts the characteristics of agents (i.e., children and parents/caretakers) with marketing related effects to explain how these agents make short- and long-term decisions in the food category. We develop each of the components of our framework with different theories and multiple empirical examples, focusing on how children develop their food preferences and how their understanding of and resistance to persuasion and marketing messages may influence choices. Overall, the presented approach suggests firms, consumers, and parents can benefit from taking these factors into account when making choices that affect children and when allowing children to make their own choices

Eating and Drinking in Childhood

This chapter describes the development of eating and drinking in typically developing children up to the end of school age. Together with physiological and cognitive development, children’s eating behavior undergoes major evolutions. During the early period when eating is essential to sustain growth, children eat easily and at the onset of complementary feeding discover the foods of their future diet which are marked by distinct tastes, flavors, and textures from the milk they had received before. Then they undergo a period when they may become picky and/or neophobic, which may last until school age. For this reason, eating and drinking will first be described in infancy, before the onset of food neophobia (from birth to 2–3 years), during the preschool years (from 2–3 years to 6 years), and right after this period, in school-aged children (from 7 years until 11 years). The mysteries of (pre)adolescent eating and drinking will not be covered in this chapter. Then, within each section, the following aspects will be covered: sensory capacities, likes and dislikes, attitudes and thinking, and role of the environment, including the family environment