WEEK 6- DIETARY LEARNING AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF EATING BEHAVIOURS

Question 1

what type of foods do children prefer?

Answer 1

sweet foods

Question 2

what is a major factor in children liking foods?

Answer 2

learned acceptance

Question 3

what is an example of something we consume that is driven by learned acceptance?

Answer 3

think we like the taste of beer but it is just because we associate it with being drunk - same with coffee

Question 4

what do we innately have a rejection for?

Answer 4

sour and bitter tastes

Question 5

what do we innately have acceptance for?

Answer 5

sweet and salty foods

Question 6

when do experience with flavours begin?

Answer 6

before birth

Question 7

what are the four stages of flavour experience in children?

Answer 7

prenatal exposure to maternal diet, milk feeding, introduction of complementary foods or weaning, self-feeding child

Question 8

which stage is unique to humans?

Answer 8

complementary feeding/ weaning

Question 9

at what age is the weaning period?

Answer 9

4 months

Question 10

how are flavours transferred to the child during pregnancy?

Answer 10

via the amniotic fluid- can be exposed to many components of the maternal diet

Question 11

what is an example that babies have prenatal experience of flavours

Answer 11

a study was done by Manella et al where pregnant mothers ingested anise or didn’t ingest anise- babies of mothers who had did were more accepting to eating it by sticking tongue out and licking

Question 12

what is a downfall of the flavour study?

Answer 12

needs to be replicated

Question 13

breast milk is perfectly matched to what?

Answer 13

to infant’s nutritional needs

Question 14

what did a meta- analysis about breastfeeding show?- victora et al

Answer 14

breastfeeding protects against child infections and likely reduces overweight and diabetes

Question 15

what did the meta- analysis show about the benefits of breast feeding for mothers?

Answer 15

protects against breast cancer and might also protect against overian cancer and type 2 diabetes

Question 16

what does breast feeding transfer?

Answer 16

antibodies from mother to child

Question 17

if you are breastfeeding when should you start introducing other foods?

Answer 17

6 months

Question 18

did breastfed or bottle fed infants grow faster?

Answer 18

breastfed- but bottle fed catch up by the first year

Question 19

at one year breastfed babies are what? and what might this prevent?

Answer 19

leaner- may help prevent obesity in later life

Question 20

breastfeeding may promote what? - heinig et al

Answer 20

nutritional wisdom or self regulation of energy intake

Question 21

what does a greater experience of a range of flavours from maternal diet increase?

Answer 21

increases acceptance of new foods at weaning, breastfed infants are less picky and eat more fruit and vegetables in later childhood relative to formula- fed infants

Question 22

why does breastfeeding increase acceptance?

Answer 22

different flavours passed through the mothers milk

Question 23

what is weaning before 4 months linked to?

Answer 23

Obesity

Question 24

what does weaning at 6 months coincide with?

Answer 24

developmental milestones- teeth begin to appear, infant starts to handle food

Question 25

most foods are accepted when?

Answer 25

early stages of weaning

Question 26

what is later introduction of solid textured foods associated with?- Coulthard et al 2009

Answer 26

lower fruit and vegetable consumption and greater feeding difficulties at 7 years of age

Question 27

what is food neophobia?

Answer 27

fear and avoidance of new foods

Question 28

when does food neophobia usually occur?

Answer 28

2 years

Question 29

why does food neophobia occur?

Answer 29

may be a protective mechanism against the possiblility of swallowing dangerous substances

Question 30

what did a study by Cohen et al in 2006 find?

Answer 30

neophobic 4-5 year olds ate less fruit, vegetables and protein foods eg chicken and cheese and total calories than non- neophobic children. however there was no difference in consumption of bread or snack foods

Question 31

what was found about the importance of exposure

Answer 31

8-15 exposures required in 3-4 year olds- Sullivan and Birch 1990

Question 32

what theory does this importance of exposure relate to?

Answer 32

mere exposure effect- zajonc 1968

Question 33

what is learned safety?

Answer 33

repeated ingestion of an unfamiliar food without negative gastro-intestinal consequences leads to increased acceptance of that food- ‘children like what they know and eat what they lie’- Cook 2007

Question 34

what did Birch and Fisher 1998 say about children and learned associations with food?

Answer 34

young children readily learn associations between a food’s flavour and the post- ingestive consequences of eating it. if eating a food is followed by good feelings (eg satiety) a learned preference may occur (flavour- nutrient learning)- example of classical conditioning

Question 35

what is the preload paradigm?- Birch and Deysher 1985

Answer 35

one group of children given a high energy preload (chocolate) pudding one group given a low energy preload pudding (vanilla) they both then had ad libitum access to buffet. they then did an extinction test trial and gave them the same flavours which were isocaloric- those with chocolate flavour ate less

Question 36

are younger children or older children more sensitive to the energy content of foods than older children (cecil et al 2005)

Answer 36

younger children

Question 37

what are the four broad aspects of parental feeding style:

Answer 37

1. restriction- usually of access to unhealthy foods but sometimes just more overall foods particularly energy dense snacks 2. pressuring- usually to eat more healthy foods but sometimes just more food overall, particularly at mealtimes 3. instrumental feeding- use of food treats as rewards 4. emotional feeding- offering foods to manage childrne’s negative mood states

Question 38

What did fisher and birch find about restricting access to palatable foods

Answer 38

restricting access to palatable foods affects childrens behavioural repsonses, food selection and intake- they found that restricting childrens access increased children spontaneous behavioural responses to the restricted food (apple and peach fruit bar cookies) also relative to similar periods when it was freely available. but the effects of restriction did not generalise to other eating contexts

Question 39

what did carper et al find about the emergence of dietary restraint and disinhibition in young girls with parental control in feeding

Answer 39

one third of 5 year old girls reported moderate levels of dietary restraint, 25% showed evidence of emotional disinhibition and nearly 75% reported externally disinhibited eating in the prescence of palatable foods. girls dietary restraint and emotional disinhibition were related to their perception of parental pressure to eat more, external disinhibition was related to their perceptions of having restrictions placed on their eating

Question 40

what question has been asked about the direction of causality with child adiposity?

Answer 40

does greater parental control of child feeding increase child adiposity? or does child adiposity ‘induce’ controlling practices

Question 41

what did webber et al 2010 find about the direction of causality with child adiposity?

Answer 41

the results showed that higher child BMI at baseline predicted increased use of monitoring and lower use of pressure to eat over a 3- year period. in contrast, none of the maternal feeding practices at baseline were associated with change in adiposity at follow- up.

Question 42

what methods do we need to use to assess cross- sectional associations?

Answer 42

longitudinal methods

Question 43

what was found about children and the impact of genes on weight

Answer 43

impact of genes on weight is significantly greater for children brought up in high risk obesogenic environments compared to children from less obesogenic environments- suggests that genetic susceptability to obesity will be most highly expressed in early home environments that are more obesogenic

Question 44

what is a risk of excess adiposity at age 9 years

Answer 44

higher dietary energy density at age 7 years but not 5 years- perhaps reflecting the ability to compensate for extra calories in an energy dense diet.

Question 45

what does the higher dietary energy density at 7 years suggest about interventions for obesity?

Answer 45

they should begin at an early age to prevent the formation of preferences for energy dense foods

Question 46

what is suggested is a good way to change children’s diets

Answer 46

1. health education campaigns- inform people about what they should and shouldn’t eat 2. need interventions that really work- make contact with children’s psychology- that are evidence based/ evaluated- that actually change behaviour

Question 47

what is more frequent intake of fruit and vegetables in children associated with?- rassmussen et al 2006

Answer 47

younger children, gender (girls), socio-economic status, preferences, parental intake, home availability

Question 48

what were the ten most highly rated food preferences in children- cooke and wardle 2005?

Answer 48

chocolate, pizza, icecream, pasta, strawberries, chocolate biscuits, ice lollies, grapes, cakes and fruti sweets

Question 49

what were the ten lowest rates food by children? cooke and wardle 2006

Answer 49

spinach leeks marrow swede sprouts turnips textured vegetable protein, soya meat, liver- sausage and liver

Question 50

what were the results of the flavour- nutrient learning study?- gertrude et al

Answer 50

failed because children wouldn’t taste the foods in the first place

Question 51

what was the exposure led intervention tested by wardle et al

Answer 51

156 parents of 2-6 year old children were randomly assigned to one of three groups: 1. exposure (parents offered child a taste of target vegetable daily for 14 days) 2. information (given a leaflet with advice and suggestions for increasing children’s fruit and vegetable consumption 3. control pre and post intervention taste tests to measure liking and intake of target vegetable

Question 52

what was the finding of the exposure led intervention by wardle et al 2003?

Answer 52

greater increases in liking and intake of the target vegetable in the exposure group compared to the other groups

Question 53

what are other types of exposure interventions that have been tested?

Answer 53

toddlers were repeatedly exposed to fruit and vegetable ‘picture books’- increased visual preference for the foods- Houston-Price, Burton et al 2009

Question 54

what is meant by the social context of eating?

Answer 54

children imitate the food choices and eating practices of people in their social environment ie parents, teachers, peers, popular cultural figures- parental intake of fruit and vegetables is one of the strongest determinants of vegetable consumption in children

Question 55

what food did popeye increase the consumption of in the 1920’s?

Answer 55

spinach- sales of spinach increased by a third and it became one of the most popular foods among American youngsters

Question 56

what is the social matching of food intake and why does this occur?

Answer 56

people tend to model or match the amount eaten by others- Salvy et al 2007 - depends on age, gender and familiarity. social approval and need for affiliation - robinson et al 2011

Question 57

what is the ‘blue foods’ study?

Answer 57

impact of peer behaviour on novel food consumption in 5-7 year old children - greenhalgh et al 2009- exposure to ‘positive’ peers who avidly consumed target food= 71% consumption. exposure to negative peers who rejected target food- 2% consumption. all foods coloured blue and given made up names- needed novelty to control the experiment

Question 58

is the use of rewards to increase consumption of healthy foods harmful or helpful?

Answer 58

consensus among researchers that desirable food items should not be used as rewards for consumption of other foods. it causes over-justification ‘if she has to give me something to eat this stuff i must not like it’- big area of controversy

Question 59

what study shows the harmful effect of rewards to increase consumption?

Answer 59

preschool children were assigned to either an instrumental eating or control condition in the instrumental condition children consumed an initially novel beverage to obtain a reward. key finding: children in the instrumental condition showed a decrease in preference for the target beverage relative to children in the control condition- neutral beverages were selcted neither liked or disliked - birch et al 1984

Question 60

whats the most recent evidence of rewards for food consumption?

Answer 60

most recent evidence suggests that use of non-food rewards can be an effective way to increase consumption of vegetables. the problem is not the rewards per se but the way they are used. most effective if: desirabe, contigent on the individuals behaviour, signal the child that they are for behaviour that is both high status and enjoyable and avoid coercive and negative associations eg the food dudes programme

Question 61

what are the three key components of the food dudes healthy eating programme?

Answer 61

1. role modelling- children watch exciting movie adventures featuring the food dudes 2. repeated testing- they are encouraged to taste fruit and vegetables 3. rewards- if they taste and eat their fruit and vegetables they earn food dudes rewards - found significant results and significant increases in home fruit and vegetable intake as reported by parents

Question 62

why does the food dudes programme work?

Answer 62

developing liking for taste of fruit and vegetables, changes culture within school, generalisation to family home, alters self-concept ‘fruit and vegetable’ eaters.