title: Strategies Low-Income Parents Use to Overcome Their Children's Food Refusal.
abstract: Introduction Parents play a key role in the development of eating habits in preschool children, as they are the food "gatekeepers." Repeated exposure to new foods can improve child food preferences and consumption. The objective of this study was to determine parent feeding strategies used to influence child acceptance of previously rejected foods (PRF). Methods We conducted eighteen focus groups (total participants = 111) with low-income African American and Hispanic parents of preschool children (3- to 5-year-olds) in Texas, Colorado, and Washington. Through thematic analysis, we coded transcripts and analyzed coded quotes to develop dominant emergent themes related to strategies used to overcome children's food refusal. Results We found three major themes in the data: parents most often do not serve PRF; parents value their child eating over liking a food; and parents rarely use the same feeding strategy more than once for a PRF. Desiring to reduce waste and save time, parents said they most often intentionally decided not to purchase or serve PRF to their children. Discussion Because parents' primary goal in child feeding is getting children to eat (over acceptance of a variety of foods), strategies to help parents promote consumption of less easily accepted foods could help parents with child feeding struggles and improve children's dietary quality.
authors.affiliation: Department of Food, Bioprocessing, and Nutrition Sciences, North Carolina State University, Campus Box 7624, Raleigh, NC, 27695-7624, USA. suzie_goodell@ncsu.edu.
authors.forename: L Suzanne
authors.identifier: 0000-0003-2188-1268
authors.initials: LS
authors.lastname: Goodell
authors.affiliation: Children's Eating Laboratory, Department of Pediatrics, University of Colorado Denver School of Medicine, Building 500, Box F561, 13001 East 17th Place, Aurora, CO, 80045, USA.
authors.forename: Susan L
authors.initials: SL
authors.lastname: Johnson
authors.affiliation: Department of Food, Bioprocessing, and Nutrition Sciences, North Carolina State University, Campus Box 7624, Raleigh, NC, 27695-7624, USA.
authors.forename: Amanda C
authors.initials: AC
authors.lastname: Antono
authors.affiliation: Department of Human Development, Washington State University, PO Box 644852, Pullman, WA, 99164-4852, USA.
authors.forename: Thomas G
authors.initials: TG
authors.lastname: Power
authors.affiliation: Department of Pediatrics, USDA/ARS Children's Nutrition Research Center, Baylor College of Medicine, 1100 Bates Street, Houston, TX, 77030-2600, USA.
authors.forename: Sheryl O
authors.initials: SO
authors.lastname: Hughes
mesh_terms: D001741:Black or African American / Q000208:ethnology / Q000523:psychology; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003120:Colorado / Q000208:ethnology; D005247:Feeding Behavior / Q000208:ethnology / Q000523:psychology; D005260:Female; D017144:Focus Groups; D005518:Food Preferences / Q000208:ethnology / Q000523:psychology*; D006630:Hispanic or Latino / Q000523:psychology; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010287:Parent-Child Relations; D010290:Parents / Q000523:psychology*; D011203:Poverty / Q000208:ethnology / Q000523:psychology; D036301:Qualitative Research; D013781:Texas / Q000208:ethnology; D014861:Washington / Q000208:ethnology
keywords: Child food preference; Feeding behavior; Parent child; Qualitative