Having a kid who is picky or food-resistant can be frustrating and even frightening.
The constant battles to get a few bites of something nutritious into your child’s belly leave you exhausted, and you worry that he’s not getting the sustenance he needs to grow, play, and be healthy. Then, parents are tempted to use more coercive methods to get their kids to eat, like using food as a reward or pressuring them to eat more.
Unfortunately, experts say this does more harm in the long run, and the latest study exposes how even coercive feeding tricks that may be construed as more ‘positive’ can also be damaging.
Teaching Kids To Ignore Their Bodies’ Cues
Those of us who grew up in the “finish your plate” era were not surprised to learn that pressuring kids to keep eating after they felt full actually taught a different lesson.
This type of coercive feeding technique teaches kids to ignore their bodies’ signals of hunger and fullness, which can result in a lifetime of bad relationships with food. Kids who have been forced to keep eating when they were no longer hungry can grow into adults who are prone to binging and more likely to suffer obesity or eating disorders.
Most of us know that pediatricians, dieticians, and other experts don’t recommend pressuring our kids to eat. Even the “try one bite of everything” tactic is not recommended, the Mayo Clinic explains.
Instead, they suggest that we offer various healthy options at every meal and trust that our kids will learn to eat in their own way.
Still, there are other types of coercive feeding that parents may not realize are potentially damaging.
Food As An Emotional Regulator
The latest study examined four ways parents engage with their children’s eating habits that may be potentially damaging, according to PsyPost.
The first of these is using food to calm emotions.
For example, if your child falls off a swing and is offered a bandage for his knee and a hug, he is also given a cookie as part of the soothing process. Or, he’s upset because of a broken toy, and the parent or caregiver hands him a lollipop or an ice cream.
If the sole goal is to stop the crying, these tricks will likely be effective. Still, researchers believe that they are also training another generation of eaters who will rely on sweets and treats to get through challenging situations and, as a result, have both worse relationships with food and poorer emotional regulation.
Emotional Feeding
This type of coercive feeding overlaps with the previous but can be broader.
It may include dealing with sadness via food, but it can also include situations in which any overwhelming emotion calls for eating.
It’s very normalized in human cultures to use food for mourning, celebrations, reunions, and generally for emotionally charged situations. However, experts suggest that we should make sure our kids don’t think it’s necessary to eat more than their body wants just because there are big events and big emotions in play.
Food As A Reward
Most of us are guilty of this one at one time or another. I can attest that years ago, I watched my kids clean their play area in record time when I mentioned that I was making candied apples as a post-clean-up treat.
However, it’s another behavior that researchers are suggesting we should avoid. While there’s nothing wrong with a treat, ideally, we want our kids to associate food with meeting nutritional needs and feeling full, satisfied, and healthy — not with getting the right grades or completing a task.
Swapping this out so that the reward for completing a task is something a little healthier, like a trip to the playground, isn’t too hard, and the links made in this study of four-year-olds and five-year-olds indicate that it would also improve their emotional regulation skills and relationships with food.
Instrumental Feeding (Food As Reward & Punishment)
Instrumental feeding can encompass some of the same areas as using food as a reward, but it’s also much broader.
This could include something as simple as telling your child that you’ll make their favorite meal Friday night if they are ready for school on time every morning or making a rule that desserts are only available on days when their room is clean.
It can also include tactics that are abusive or neglectful, such as taking away food for misbehavior.
Instrumental feeding has been the subject of many studies, including one in 2015 that found those whose parents used food as a reward and punishment were more prone to binge eating.
Study Limitations
This latest study only examined parental feeding practices and children’s emotional regulation simultaneously. Though it found significant correlations, a study that examined outcomes over a longer time would offer more evidence for long-term effects.
However, the study showed a strong connection between all four of these feeding practices and kids who struggle to regulate their emotions more. It also showed that kids subjected to these practices were more likely to turn to excessive eating when they felt emotionally dysregulated.
