March 15, 2006
FAMILY MEALS FOCUS #10
Interpreting the news and research about feeding and eating

Answering parents, and professionals questions about meals:
Food acceptance

Three-year-old Oscar's parents are convinced that his eating vegetables will protect him from calamity, although they aren't sure what that calamity is. Oscar rejects vegetables on sight and swore off cottage cheese when he detected the small pieces of veggies his parents had sneaked in. Oscar�s parents are experts in, positive, pressure,rewards: high fives, applause, and occupational-therapist type coaching (finger-touching, tongue-touching, tasting). They once tried withholding other food, but for a week everyone left the table in tears and Oscar still didn't eat vegetables. What to do instead?

Understand why are vegetables such a problem Eating vegetables (and to a lesser extent, fruits and whole grains) is promoted as a life-or-death matter,¹ so parents pressure children to eat them. Children react to pressure by eating less well, not better.² Vegetables are a challenge to learn to like. Some have strong flavors that truly taste bitter to some children,³ and some textures can be unpleasant at first.

Include a variety of food at meals and snacks and let the child decide to eat,or not eat You can't get children to eat what they don't want and you shouldn't try. The research is clear: Children learn to like new foods with repeated, neutral exposure. Pressure,even cheery pressure or rewards,slows or prevents that learning.²; Only in the context of the day-in-day-out of family meals will children be presented matter-of-factly with the same foods again and again. Parents get to prepare the foods they like; children learn to like foods parents eat.

Don't put foods on the table simply because they are good for children Parents who don't like a food pressure their children to eat it and children don't eat it. Parents who like a food eat it, don't pressure, and children eat it.⁴ Parents are entitled to respect their own food likes and dislikes and serve foods that they enjoy. Parents whose list of food likes is very short can sneak up on new food and learn to like it, just like their children do.⁵ But they mustn't foist it on their children.

Don't hang your sense of accomplishment on your child's eating The cook's job is done when the meal goes on the table. After that, it is up to the eaters. A telephone survey of almost 200 parents found that the second greatest barrier to family meals,after not having enough time to cook,was children's picky eating. Almost half avoided introducing new foods because they anticipated the child wouldn't eat them.⁶ The impossible dream of pleasing every eater with every food at every meal has been the downfall of many family cooks.

Read Family Meals Focus #2 to review the division of responsibility in feeding, #4 for a reminder of the importance of family meals, #5 for tips on being considerate without catering with meal-planning, #8 about orchestrating family-style meals and #9 about making mealtimes pleasant. For more about preparing fast, efficient and delicious meals, read Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family .

Reference List

1. United States Department of Agriculture and United States Department of Health and Human Services. Dietary Guidelines for Americans 2005. 2005; accessed August 15, 2005. Web Page. Available at: http://www.health.gov/dietaryguidelines/dga2005/document/default.htm.

2. Birch LL. Development of food acceptance patterns. Developmental Psychology. 1990;26(4):515-519.

3. Turnbull B, Matisoo-Smith E. Taste sensitivity to 6-n-propylthiouracil predicts acceptance of bitter-tasting spinach in 3-6-y-old children. Am J Clin Nutr. 2002;76:1101-1105.

4. Fisher JO, Mitchell DC, Smiciklas-Wright H, Birch LL. Parental influences on young girls' fruit and vegetable, micronutrient, and fat intakes. Journal of the American Dietetic Association. 2002;1025:58-64.

5. Satter EM; Learning about new food. Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family. Madison, WI: Kelcy Press; 1999:186.

6. CMU Public Broadcasting, Michigan Nutrition Network. Healthy Weight in Preschool Children a Project of Central Michigan University Public Television, Mt. Pleasant MI. 2005.

Family Meals Focus by Ellyn Satter, MS, RD, LCSW, BCD. discusses trends, research and clinical issues in eating and feeding and interprets other research from a feeding-dynamics, eating-competence perspective. For past issues of Family Meals Focus, click here.

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