Parents pushing children hard to eat healthy foods can do more harm than good, study finds

Forcing children to eat spinach may not be in their best interest, as many parents think

One often sees at the table: the child who does not want not eat your vegetables or other nutritious food that otherwise does not attract some children. Unfortunately, parents often feel helpless about what they can do to combat such a problem. The problem causes significant stress because child nutrition is a major concern for most parents.

One solution by many parents is to take a firm approach to force their children to eat healthy foods that the child does not particularly care about. .

Futurity recently referred to a study that concluded that promoting healthy foods in children may not have been the best way to persuade them to eat properly. In fact, it can actually cause harm to both the child and the parent-child relationship.

One of the biggest fears of parents, besides general malnutrition in difficult children, is obesity. Some researchers are now postulating that eating difficult in itself is largely without consequence on childhood obesity. Julie Lumeng, a professor of nutritional science at the School of Public Health at the University of Michigan, says the weight is not obviously affected by a tendency to eat with difficulty.

Lumeng, who is also a professor of pediatrics and communicable diseases at the University of Michigan Medical School, also said that the likelihood that the behavior changes significantly seems to be low.

"In a nutshell, we found that more than a year of life in infancy, the weight remained stable on the graph of growth, whether or not they were difficult eaters. The difficult menu of the children was not very variable, it remained the same, whether or not the parents pressed their difficult eaters. "

With regard to the question of whether the pressure exerted by parents could reduce the presence of sharp food in children, Lumeng does not seem to be a promoter.] "Then we asked if the pressure led to a decrease in difficult intake, and this is not not the case.

According to the study, and as Julie Lumeng said, the presence of a difficult diet can be a nuisance and a nuisance for parents, causing headaches and aches and pains. of head.

From a statistical point of view, however, eating "selective" or "selective" in children is rarely a serious health problem and is not generally considered a minor defect.