ResearchResearch and Professional BriefParental Feeding Practices in the United States and in France: Relationships with Child's Characteristics and Parent's Eating Behavior
Section snippets
Study Design
Families participated in a cross-sectional study on children's eating behavior, which took place in the United States and in France to explore transcultural differences. The US sample was recruited (May 2004 to August 2004) from preschools in a mid-sized Midwestern city and surrounding towns. The French sample was recruited (October 2005 to January 2006) from schools in a large city and a small town in the Ile-de-France and Picardy regions, respectively. French preschools were chosen to have
Participant Characteristics
Familial income was roughly comparable between the samples (Table 1): the median yearly income was $75,000 to $90,000 in the United States and 60,000€ to 70,000€ in France. However, French parents reported a higher education level. In the US sample, 97% of the parents were white and, in the French sample, 89% of the parents were born in France and 78% reported that both of their parents had been born in France as well. The French children were slightly older than the American children, but
Conclusion
In sum, the current findings emphasize the association between parents' attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors and how they feed their children. Given the potential medical and psychological risks associated with unhealthful eating habits and overweight in children, research that identifies the factors associated with specific feeding practices can help practitioners better understand and prevent negative outcomes.
B. de Lauzon-Guillain is a research fellow, Institut national de la santé et de la recherché médicale (INSERM), Institut fédératif de recherche 69 (IFR69), U780, Villejuif, France.
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2022, AppetiteCitation Excerpt :The internal consistency of the different scales was satisfactory, except for maternal use of food as a reward, which had a lower Cronbach's α, which could limit the interpretation of the results. Nevertheless, our results for this scale are consistent with previous findings (de Lauzon-Guillain et al., 2009; Miller et al., 2020; Wardle et al., 2002), which suggests the reliability of our results. Because previous literature suggested that mothers could differ in their use of feeding practices by their perceptions of their child's weight status (Freitas et al., 2019), a supplemental adjustment on child's WHO BMI z-score at 2 years was performed.
The role of peers, siblings and social media for children's healthy eating socialization: a mixed methods study
2021, Food Quality and PreferenceMental health symptoms are related to mothers’ use of controlling and responsive child feeding practices: A replication and extension study
2020, AppetiteCitation Excerpt :Higher scores show greater use of that feeding practice. The CFPQ is a well-used measure which demonstrates good validity and reliability (e.g., De Lauzon-Guillain et al., 2009; Musher-Eizenman & Holub, 2007). The DEBQ measures three types of eating behaviour: external eating (e.g., “If food smells and looks good, do you eat more than usual?”),
B. de Lauzon-Guillain is a research fellow, Institut national de la santé et de la recherché médicale (INSERM), Institut fédératif de recherche 69 (IFR69), U780, Villejuif, France.
M. A. Charles is director of research, Institut national de la santé et de la recherché médicale (INSERM), Institut fédératif de recherche 69 (IFR69), U780, Villejuif, France.
D. Musher-Eizenman is an associate professor, Department of Psychology, Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, OH.
E. Leporc is a scientist at Direction départementale des affaires sanitaires et sociales (DDASS) de Seine et Marne, Melun, France; at the time of the study, she was a student at INSERM, IFR69, U780, Villejuif, France.
S. Holub is an assistant professor, Department of Psychological Sciences, University of Texas, Dallas; at the time of the study, she was a doctoral student in the Department of Psychology, Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, OH.
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Drs de Lauzon-Guillain and Musher-Eizenman contributed equally to this work.