Controlling feeding practices and psychopathology in a non-clinical sample of mothers and fathers

doi:10.1016/j.eatbeh.2008.07.007

Eating Behaviors

Volume 9, Issue 4, December 2008, Pages 484-492

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eatbeh.2008.07.007 Get rights and content

Abstract

Objective

To explore the relationships between controlling feeding practices and a range of mental health symptoms while considering both parent and child gender.

Method

Mothers and fathers (N = 214) of children aged 18–59 months completed self-report measures of their child feeding practices, eating psychopathology and general mental health symptomology.

Results

Feeding practices did not differ across any of the four parent–child gender dyads. Mothers’ eating psychopathology scores were significantly higher than fathers’ but parents did not significantly differ in the severity of their other mental health symptoms. Associations between disordered eating symptoms and controlling feeding practices were only seen in mothers of daughters and fathers of sons. In general, a range of mental health symptomologies in this non-clinical sample were related to more controlling feeding practices across all four dyads. Psychopathology was most strongly related to controlling feeding practices in parents of girls.

Conclusion

Symptoms of psychopathology may be more likely to associate with controlling feeding practices in parents of daughters due to societal values for slimness in females.

Section snippets

Participants

One hundred and seven mothers and 107 fathers of children aged between 18 and 59 months were recruited through nurseries in Cambridgeshire and the West Midlands in the UK. The mean age of the mothers was 35 years (SD 4.28, range 22–46 years) and the mean age of the fathers was 37 years (SD 5.35, range 23–53 years). The sample of children comprised 65 girls (mean age 41 months, SD 10.53, range 18–59 months) and 42 boys (mean age 42 months, SD 11.09, range 19–59 months). Fifty-two percent of the

Results

The mean pressure to eat and restriction scores presented in Table 1 were in line with those from another study using mothers and fathers of preschool-age children (Blissett et al., 2006). There were no significant differences found between parents of daughters and sons in their use of controlling feeding practices.

Mothers’ scores on the EDI-2, as presented in Table 2, were broadly comparable with data from normal adult samples (e.g. Berman et al., 1993, Blissett et al., 2007). Although

Discussion

The current exploratory study aimed to test for associations between controlling feeding practices and a range of psychopathologies in mothers of daughters, mothers of sons, fathers of daughters and fathers of sons. It also aimed to test for differences in the use of controlling feeding practices across the four types of dyad, and differences between mothers’ and fathers’ psychopathology scores. In general, the study’s hypotheses were partially supported.

Significant associations between eating

References (42)

BermanK. et al.
Eating attitudes in seasonal affective disorder and bulimia nervosa
Journal of Affective Disorders
(1993)
BirchL.L. et al.
Confirmatory factor analysis of the Child Feeding Questionnaire: A measure of parental attitudes, beliefs and practices about child feeding and obesity proneness
Appetite
(2001)
BirchL.L. et al.
Learning to overeat: Maternal use of restrictive feeding practices promotes girls’ eating in the absence of hunger
American Journal of Clinical Nutrition
(2003)
BlissettJ. et al.
Maternal and paternal controlling feeding practices with male and female children
Appetite
(2006)
BlissettJ. et al.
Maternal mental health and child feeding problems in a non-clinical group
Eating Behaviors
(2007)
CarperJ.L. et al.
Young girls’ emerging dietary restraint and disinhibition are related to parental control in child feeding
Appetite
(2000)
CoulthardH. et al.
The relationship between parental eating problems and children’s feeding behavior: A selective review of the literature
Eating Behaviors
(2004)
FisherJ.O. et al.
Restricting access to foods and children’s eating
Appetite
(1999)
FrancisL.A. et al.
Predictors of maternal child-feeding style: Maternal and child characteristics
Appetite
(2001)
HudsonJ.I. et al.
The prevalence and correlates of eating disorders in the National Comorbidity Survey Replication
Biological Psychiatry
(2007)

HughesS.O. et al.

Revisiting a neglected construct: Parenting styles in a child-feeding context

Appetite

(2005)

PatrickH. et al.

The benefits of authoritative feeding style: Caregiver feeding styles and children’s food consumption patterns

Appetite

(2005)

ThelenM.H. et al.

Desire to be thinner and weight control among children and their parents

Behavior Therapy

(1995)

TiggemannM. et al.

Predictors of maternal control over children’s eating behaviour

Appetite

(2002)

CostanzoP.R. et al.

Domain-specific parenting styles and their impact on the child’s development of particular deviance: The example of obesity proneness

Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology

(1985)

CoxA.D. et al.

The impact of maternal depression in young children

Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry and Allied Disciplines

(1987)

CummingsE.M. et al.

Maternal depression and child development

Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry

(1994)

DerogatisL.R.

Brief Symptom Inventory: Administration, Scoring and Procedures Manual

(1993)

DerogatisL.R. et al.

The Brief Symptom Inventory: An introductory report

Psychological Medicine

(1983)

Eating Disorder Association

Eating Disorders in the United Kingdom: Review of the Provision of Health Care Services for Men with Eating Disorders. Presentation by J. Copperman for the EDA, 14 February 2000

(2000)

EdmundsH. et al.

Dieting and the family context of eating in young adolescent children

International Journal of Eating Disorders

(1999)

Cited by (49)

Relationship of baby led weaning to other parenting and feeding constructs
2023, Journal of Pediatric Nursing
This article has been retracted: please see Elsevier Policy on Article Withdrawal (https://www.elsevier.com/locate/withdrawalpolicy).
This article has been retracted at the request of the Editor-in-Chief after learning that the authors did not obtain permission to use the sDOR.2-6y instrument, which must be granted by the Ellyn Satter Institute and the NEEDs Center at the Rochester Institute of Technology. In addition, the tool was misinterpreted and misapplied, which has led to inaccurate findings as reported in the article. The authors apologize for these mistakes and any inconvenience.
Coparenting: Associations with parents' psychological distress and children's food approach behavior
2023, Appetite
Parents' psychological distress has been associated with their children's obesogenic eating yet less is known about how coparenting moderates this relationship. The aim of the current research was 1) to examine how coparenting (general and feeding) moderates the associations between parents' psychological distress and children's food approach behavior after accounting for parents' coercive control food parenting and 2) to examine whether feeding coparenting interacted with psychological distress to predict children's food approach behavior above and beyond general coparenting. Parents (n = 216; M_age = 36.28 years, SD = 6.12) of 3- to 5- year old children completed an online survey. Analyses revealed that undermining coparenting and feeding coparenting (but not supportive coparenting) moderated the association between parents' psychological distress and children's food approach behavior. Additionally, analyses revealed that feeding coparenting interacted with psychological distress to predict children's food approach behavior above and beyond general coparenting. These findings suggest that less optimal coparenting relationships, particularly feeding coparenting, may exacerbate the influence of parents' psychological distress on obesogenic eating behaviors in children.
Mental health matters: Parent mental health and children's emotional eating
2023, Appetite
Parents' symptoms of anxiety and depression are associated with their increased likelihood of using nonresponsive feeding practices and with children's elevated obesity risk. These feeding practices, particularly persuasive-controlling feeding practices, have further been linked to children's emotional eating, including both emotional overeating and undereating. To help future research identify points of interventions to reduce children's maladaptive eating behaviors, the goal of this study was to determine whether persuasive-controlling feeding practices mediated the link between parent mental health and children's emotional eating. Feeding practices were measured by the FPSQ. Anxiety was measured by the GAD-7. Depression was measured by the CESD-R. Emotional eating was measured by the CEBQ. Survey data were collected from 259 U.S. parents of preschool children as a part of a larger study. Results from structural equation modeling showed that nonresponsive feeding behaviors mediated the relationship between parent mental health and children's emotional eating. Future longitudinal studies and clinical trials should examine whether and how persuasive-controlling feeding practices explain the link between parents' mental health and children's maladaptive eating behaviors, including emotional eating.
Controlling feeding practices moderate the relationship between emotionality and food fussiness in young children
2022, Appetite
Emotional child temperament has consistently been found to be related to food fussiness. One factor that may exacerbate or reduce the risk conferred by children's emotionality is parent feeding practices during mealtimes. Specifically, the use of controlling feeding practices aimed at increasing food consumption may particularly affect children with an emotional temperament. The primary aim of this study was to investigate whether the association between child food fussiness and higher emotionality found in previous studies is moderated by maternal use of controlling feeding practices, namely verbal pressure, physical prompts and food rewards. Sixty-seven mother-child dyads were video-recorded during a meal in their home and mothers' use of controlling feeding practices during this meal were coded. Mothers completed a questionnaire assessing child temperament. Moderation analyses revealed that maternal use of verbal pressure and physical prompts moderated the relationship between higher emotionality and food fussiness, but maternal use of food rewards did not. These results indicate that the use of verbal pressure and physical prompts may have a particularly negative influence on fussy eating for children higher in emotionality.
Intuitive Eating among Parents: Associations with the Home Food and Meal Environment
2022, Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics
Parents have a role in shaping the eating behaviors of young children and the intergenerational transmission of eating attitudes. However, little is known regarding how parental intuitive eating practices are related to characteristics of home food and meal environments.
To investigate the relationship between parental intuitive eating and the home food and meal environment.
Cross-sectional analysis of survey data collected online and by mail in 2015–2016 as part of the Project EAT cohort study.
Participants from 750 unique households (470 mothers, 280 fathers) were surveyed in young adulthood (Mean [M] age = 31.4 years, Standard Deviation [SD] = 1.5). Baseline enrollment of participants in the population-based Project EAT study was conducted in Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota, schools.
Intuitive eating was assessed via self-report.
Modified Poisson regression models were conducted, adjusting for age, race/ethnicity, and socioeconomic status.
Among mothers, higher intuitive eating scores were associated with greater likelihood of usually having fruits and vegetables in the home (prevalence ratio [PR] = 1.03) and with lower likelihood of usually having salty snacks and soda pop in the home (PR = 0.91). Higher intuitive eating scores were also associated with greater likelihood of usually serving fruits and vegetables at dinner among mothers (PR = 1.07). Among both mothers (PR = 1.08) and fathers (PR = 1.07), higher intuitive eating scores were associated with greater likelihood of usually having enough time and energy to prepare meals.
Intuitive eating practices in parents are associated with specific home food environment characteristics. Extending the understanding of these relationships in longitudinal data has the potential to inform the directionality of influences and may help to identify targets for intervention.
The relationship between parental food parenting practices & child eating behavior: A comparison of mothers and fathers
2021, Appetite
The objective of this study was to compare the relationships between food parenting practices and child eating behavior among mothers and fathers of young children. This cross-sectional study recruited mothers (n = 127) and fathers (n = 118) of children (4.2 ± 1.3 years old) to complete surveys (face-to-face and online). Each parent completed the Comprehensive Food Parenting Questionnaire, Children's Eating Behavior Questionnaire, and demographic questions. Linear regressions were used to compare the relationships between parental food parenting practices and children's eating behaviors with parent sex as a moderator. Child age and sex served as control variables in each regression. Parent sex was a significant moderator in several relationships between parent food parenting practices and child eating behavior. In the relationship between parental restriction for health (ß = -.14, p = .014) and monitoring (ß = -.13, p = .028) and child slowness in eating, the slope of the interaction was significantly higher for mothers, meaning that when mothers and fathers use the same level of restriction for health and monitoring, child slowness in eating is higher for children of mothers. When mothers and fathers used the same level of restriction for weight, child food responsiveness (ß = .13, p = .003) and emotional overeating (ß = .12, p = .046) was significantly higher for children of fathers. There may be differences in how mothers and fathers implement food parenting practices and/or differences in how these practices impact children. Specifically, for fathers, it seems that the use of restriction for weight is more detrimental for children's eating behaviors compared to when mothers use the same level of restriction for weight.

View all citing articles on Scopus

View full text

Controlling feeding practices and psychopathology in a non-clinical sample of mothers and fathers

Abstract

Objective

Method

Results

Conclusion

Section snippets

Participants

Results

Discussion

Journal of Affective Disorders

Appetite

American Journal of Clinical Nutrition

Appetite

Eating Behaviors

Appetite

Eating Behaviors

Appetite

Appetite

Biological Psychiatry

Appetite

Appetite

Behavior Therapy

Appetite

Domain-specific parenting styles and their impact on the child’s development of particular deviance: The example of obesity proneness

Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology

The impact of maternal depression in young children

Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry and Allied Disciplines

Maternal depression and child development

Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry

Brief Symptom Inventory: Administration, Scoring and Procedures Manual

The Brief Symptom Inventory: An introductory report

Psychological Medicine

Eating Disorders in the United Kingdom: Review of the Provision of Health Care Services for Men with Eating Disorders. Presentation by J. Copperman for the EDA, 14 February 2000

Dieting and the family context of eating in young adolescent children

International Journal of Eating Disorders