Elsevier

Appetite

Volume 155, 1 December 2020, 104824
Appetite

Parents' genetic attributions for children's eating behaviors: Relationships with beliefs, emotions, and food choice behavior

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.appet.2020.104824Get rights and content

Abstract

Considering genetic influences on children's eating behavior could result in reduced self-efficacy for healthy child feeding and less healthy feeding behavior among parents. Indeed, one's eating behaviors are typically thought of as the volitional aspects of weight management that one can directly control. The current study assessed parental genetic attributions for their child's eating behavior, and relationships between these attributions and self-efficacy, guilt, and feeding behaviors. Participants included 190 parents of a child between 4 and 7 years old. Parents' genetic attributions for child eating behaviors were lower than genetic attributions related to child weight. Higher genetic attributions for child eating behaviors were related to lower self-efficacy for feeding the right amounts of food, higher-calorie food choices for the child in a virtual reality-based buffet simulation, and higher levels of guilt. The current findings suggest that heightened beliefs about role of genetics in children's eating behavior is associated with maladaptive affect and behavior among parents. This should be kept in mind when considering whether, when, and how to provide information to parents highlighting the role of genetics in children's eating behavior.

Introduction

Evidence continues to accrue that behavioral tendencies related to eating and diet are, in part, inherited. Genetic factors underlie specific eating behaviors (EB) that contribute to food intake, such as one's food preferences and tendency to eat when not hungry (Garcia-Bailo et al., 2009; Grimm & Steinle, 2011; Kral & Faith, 2008; Rankinen & Bouchard, 2006). While the concept that genes influence one's weight or obesity risk is increasingly well-known in clinical and lay community settings (Beeken & Wardle, 2013; Knerr et al., 2017; Persky et al., 2012), genetic influences on EB are less commonly considered (Persky et al., 2017). Given future visions of employing genomic approaches for weight management (Bray et al., 2016), communication about the influence of genetics on EB may one day become part and parcel of weight interventions. As such, it will be important to understand the potential cognitive, affective and behavioral ramifications of making genetic attributions for EB.

Past work suggests that there may because for concern that communicating about the connection between genetics and EB could result in fatalistic attitudes wherein children's unhealthful eating feels inevitable and uncontrollable. To the extent that individuals believe that genes underlie their own EB, they are also more likely to report reduced self-efficacy for weight management (Persky et al., 2017). This is consistent with the notion that one's EB are typically thought of as the volitional aspects of weight management that one can directly control (Meisel & Wardle, 2014). Thus, considering potential genetic (and therefore unalterable) influences on EB could disrupt a primary route of intended weight control. If these notions do indeed lead to fatalism, this would signal the need for special care in crafting communication approaches to accompany future genomics-based efforts to address weight management and rising rates of obesity.

Thus far, there is very little literature addressing the influence of genetic causal beliefs with respect to EB, and all centers on self-oriented beliefs and attitudes among adults. In contrast, it is often recommended that dietary interventions start in childhood, especially for children who are at risk of obesity later in life (Daniels & Hassink, 2015; Rao, 2008). As such, intervention strategies to improve parental feeding behavior for their young children have become a focus of attention as new interventions are developed (Birch & Ventura, 2009). For this reason, it will be crucial to understand how parents interpret the concept of genetic influence on children's EB and whether these notions are subject to fatalistic interpretations.

While there are no known studies that address parents' interpretations of genetic factors that influence their children's EB, there is limited research regarding parents' reactions to weight-related genomic information about their children, and findings are mixed. One study found that provision of genomic obesity risk information to parents of young children may be a promising strategy for improving parental feeding behavior; here, parents who received genomics-based information about their child's risk for obesity in adulthood chose to feed fewer calories to their child than control (McBride et al., 2013). However, other work has suggested that mass media-style information about genetic influences on children's weight has little influence on parents' obesity risk perception for their child. In fact, a previous study found that providing information about the interaction between genes and the family home environment to parents of children with overweight was associated with disengagement from and rejection of an obesity risk message (Persky et al., 2019).

The dearth of research regarding the correlates of causal attributions for children's EB is problematic, as these correlates will be important to understand. First, parents typically oversee feeding and weight management efforts directed at their children, and therefore will be the primary recipients of any genomic information concerning their child's propensities and risks for later life. Second, previous findings related to genetic causal attributions for obesity indicate that parents' beliefs about the genetic underpinnings of children's EB may be associated with parental behaviors aimed at weight management for the child. Indeed, as posited by Weiner's attribution theory (Weiner, 1985; Weiner et al., 2010), perceived control over conditions or traits – including beliefs about the extent of their genetic underpinnings – are important predictors of the extent to which individuals may be willing to exert effort in this domain in the future. Finally, attributions are also linked with harmful versus helpful attitudes and behavior associated with those conditions and traits (Black et al., 2014; Joslyn & Haider-Markel, 2019). Therefore, it will be essential to understand whether the causal attributions under study will be related to fatalistic attitudes and/or a reduction in self-efficacy for engaging in healthy child feeding behavior. A reduction in self-efficacy would be expected to lead to decrements in healthful child feeding.

Second, parents pass down genetic propensities related to EB to their children. Therefore, receipt of information about these propensities could influence parents’ emotional states in addition to their child-focused beliefs and behavior. Previous work has shown that providing weight-related genomic information to parents about their children may result in altered feelings of guilt (Persky et al., 2015), and parents frequently feel guilt associated with transmission of genetic risk for overweight and obesity specifically (Hagerman et al., 2020; Persky et al., 2015, 2019). It follows that beliefs among parents that they have passed down eating-related behavioral tendencies to their child may be associated with guilt, particularly to the extent that parents are dissatisfied with their own EB. Guilt itself is experienced as negative emotion, and it is yet unsettled as to whether and how guilt operates downstream to influence parent feeding behavior (Hagerman et al., 2020; Persky et al., 2015); however, given its salience in prior work, it will be an important emotion to explore in this context.

The current report elucidates the nature of parental genetic attributions for their children's EB, as well as the potential affective, cognitive, and behavioral correlates of those attributions. We do so by exploring data collected within a larger trial. Here, we assess parents' genetic and structural environment attributions for children's EB, as well as their food choice behavior and cognitive and affective outcomes (i.e., self-efficacy and guilt). Structural environment causal attributions (hereafter referred to as simply “environmental” attributions) serve as a primary point of comparison with genetic attributions, as environmental causes are typically more commonly top-of-mind with respect to EB and have been used as a comparison in previous work (Persky et al., 2017).

This study is exploratory and hypothesis-generating, and as such we did not enter the analysis with specific hypotheses. Rather, we proposed three research questions: 1) How do levels of genetic attributions for children's EB compare with other attributions, specifically, environmental attributions for EB, and environmental and genetic attributions for weight in general? 2) What parental characteristics (e.g., demographic factors, beliefs) are associated with higher genetic attributions for children's EB? 3) How are parents' genetic attributions for their child's EB associated with behavioral (feeding-related), cognitive, and affective variables?

Section snippets

Participants

Participants included 190 parents (66% mothers) of all weight statuses, and with a biological “index child” that they were instructed to consider throughout the study. The index child was a child within the defined age range of 4 and 7 years old with no major food allergies or dietary-related health conditions. If participants had more than one child who fit this description, the index child was the child with the closest birthday date (in the case of twins, the child the parent named first was

Demographics

Characteristics of the sample and of the index children are reported in Table 1.

Descriptive statistics and comparisons

See Table 2 for descriptive statistics on all variables. Parents' genetic attributions for their child's EB were lower than environmental attributions for EB, t (188) = 7.19, p < .001. In addition, genetic attributions for EB were lower than genetic attributions for overweight, t (188) = 0.958, p < .001. Environmental attributions for EB and overweight did not significantly differ.

Correlations showed that genetic

Discussion

To more successfully address rising obesity rates and increase health-promoting behavior, new approaches are needed that target weight gain prevention in young children, ostensibly via their parents. Precision medicine offers potential promise in this regard, however, optimizing delivery of these approaches will require understanding the correlates of the genomics-based beliefs that would follow from such interventions among parents. The current findings suggest that heightened beliefs about

Author contributions

SP conceived of and planned the analysis. SP and HY conducted the analysis. SP and HY wrote the manuscript. Both authors have approved the final article.

Ethics statement

The study reported here was reviewed by the IRB of the National Human Genome Research Institute. Participants gave informed consent before taking part.

Declaration of competing interest

The authors have no conflicts to report.

Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge the study team of the larger trial including Becky Ferrer, Bill Klein, Megan Goldring, Will Kistler, Rachel Cohen, and Sofia Bouhlal. We also acknowledge Manuella Jaramillo for assistance with data collection. We thank Sydney Telaak for editorial comments on an earlier version of this work. This research was supported by the Intramural Research Program of the National Human Genome Research Institute, National Institutes of Health (Z01-HG-200396-05).

References (30)

  • E.K. Cheera et al.

    Psychological and behavioral effects of genetic risk testing for obesity: A systematic review

    Personalized Medicine

    (2016)
  • S.R. Daniels et al.

    The role of the pediatrician in primary prevention of obesity

    Pediatrics

    (2015)
  • B. Garcia-Bailo et al.

    Genetic variation in taste and its influence on food selection

    OMICS: A Journal of Integrative Biology

    (2009)
  • E. Grimm et al.

    Genetics of eating behavior: Established and emerging concepts

    Nutrition Revews

    (2011)
  • C. Hagerman et al.

    Association of parental guilt with harmful versus healthful eating and feeding from a virtual reality buffet

    Health Psychology

    (2020)
  • Cited by (0)

    View full text