Picky Eaters: What You're Not Considering

Helping your picky eaters starts with thinking about your own picky eating habits. Think back to your own experience as a child around the dinner table. Was it pleasant? Was it chaotic? Did your family have a routine of sitting around the table? How did you feel in these moments? How do you think your parent/s felt in those moments?

Most of our deepest attitudes and feelings are formed when we are children- this applies to food as well. We often learn just by osmosis. We pick up on the subtleties and messages that our parents are exhibiting so it’s no wonder that the perfect place to start when learning how to raise good eaters is by examining your own relationship with food and food beliefs. You can only take your children as far as you have gone yourself.

Allow me to illustrate. Five-year-old Jane loved to eat. Her eyes would light up at the sight of food. As she grew her mother noticed that she was in a slightly bigger body than the rest of her classmates. Not taking into account differences in growth patterns and genetics her mother encouraged her to “start watching what she was eating.” This message, intended to be subtle, was a recurring one throughout Jane’s childhood. Pretty soon she put two and two together and understood that her body was wrong and that she should change it. She tried to please her mother by eating less. This backfired and a cycle started of her trying to not eat much or allow herself the foods she loved and subsequently eating too much to fill that void, both physically and emotionally.Her mother’s own stigma about being in a larger body, not allowing herself to love food, and needing to fit in under-minded Jane’s own internal cues and disrupted her relationship with food. The same story can be applied to raising children that accept a wide variety of foods. How can children be expected to eat all different foods if their parents are following a low carb diet and thus sending the message that carbs are not a necessary part of the meal? Yes, children and adults have different nutritional needs, but I can tell you with complete confidence that people of all ages need carbs as part of a balanced diet.

The First Step to Raising Good Eaters: Consider your own attitude towards food

“Whatever one’s views about the importance of a healthy diet, it is clear that many Americans spend a lot of time worrying about calories and fat and that this concern, in itself, detracts from the quality of life.” This excerpt comes from a study comparing the attitudes of adults and college students from Belgium, France, Japan, and the USA. Items in the questionnaire included:

Which is more important to you when choosing food; nutrition or taste?
Which word do you associate most with the term fried egg; health or pleasure?
Which food do you most associate with the word food; health or pleasure?
Which word do you associate most with the word ice cream; fattening or delicious?
Enjoying food is one of the most important pleasures in life; agree or disagree?
Which word do you most associate with the word broccoli; butter or vitamins?
Which word do you most associate with the word milk; cookies or calcium?
Which word do you most associate with the term holiday dinner; overeating or happiness?

Findings showed the group associating food most with health and least with pleasure is the Americans, and the group most food–pleasure-oriented and least food–health-oriented is the French. In all four countries, females, as opposed to males, show a pattern of attitudes that is more like the American pattern, and less like the French pattern.

What is most fascinating though is the lower rates of cardiovascular disease present in the French despite consuming a relatively high-fat diet; also known as the French Paradox. Perhaps it isn’t what they are eating or the amount of red wine they are consuming but their attitude towards food that is the key.

How Does This Apply to Picky Eaters?

Examining what you prioritize in food is key because it’s important to the durability of both parents and children’s eating habits. One of my favorite quotes that illustrates this perfectly is by Ellyn Satter. She says, “When the joy goes out of eating, nutrition suffers.”

Studies back this claim up as well, people that have higher overall eating competence scores and higher food acceptance enjoy a greater variety of foods and variety is a key component to nutrition in diets. Another factor to consider is our response when we see food. At just the sight of appealing food our mouth waters and stomachs growl. This is called the cephalic phase of digestion; the physiological process where your body reacts to the sight and smell of appealing food and prepares to receive it. This process happens with appealing foods but not with unappealing foods and actually helps us absorb nutrients.

Children learn by example. If you want your child to enjoy and therefore eat a variety of foods you have to lead the way. Bottom line: enjoyment is a key part of eating attitudes and encouraging a variety of foods.

Some skills that are important to foster this are:

Being calm in the presence of unfamiliar foods, including disliked foods. Instead of saying, “We don’t eat olives because they are gross.” Try allowing olives on part of the dish and let your children explore for themselves if they like it or not.

Being comfortable with eating foods that you enjoy, including those that are high in fat and sugar. Allow your picky eaters to see that there is more to food than just calories and that foods should be savored. Eating with a supportive family member that likes the food increases children’s food acceptance. Acting as the food police and restricting “junk food” might actually be doing more harm than good for your child long term.

Being curious about novel food. By doing so you are setting the example and encouraging your children to expand their own palates.

Be willing to experiment with that novel food and becoming familiar enough with it to add it to your repertoire. Repeated exposure is key, for children it might take 10 to 20 times of trying a food before learning to like it. Breastfed infants are also more receptive to first-time exposures, presumably because they are accustomed to flavors conveyed through their mother’s milk. For more ideas on empowering your picky eaters check out this post.

Repeated NEUTRAL exposure without pressure Children are more likely to try new foods when they aren’t pressured into it. They must be allowed to try the new food repeatedly without pressure even in the form of praise or reward. Preschoolers trying juice on their own initiative were found to be more likely to try it again than preschoolers who were rewarded for tasting it.

Talk about food in terms of flavor and enjoyment, not just what they offer nutritionally. “This is my favorite meal because it’s one we all get to enjoy together as a family.” or “These peaches make me happy because they remind me of summer.” Check out this blog post for more ideas of how to talk to your child about food and nutrition and for more ideas on empowering your picky eaters check out this post.