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Randomized Controlled Trial
. 2024 Aug:124:112454.
doi: 10.1016/j.nut.2024.112454. Epub 2024 Apr 6.

Longitudinal associations between food parenting practices and dietary intake in preschool children: The ToyBox Study

Paloma Flores-Barrantes  1 , Pilar De Miguel-Etayo  1 , Iris Iglesia  2 , Mai Jm ChinAPaw  3 , Greet Cardon  4 , Marieke De Craemer  5 , Violeta Iotova  6 , Natalya Usheva  7 , Zbigniew Kułaga  8 , Aneta Kotowska  8 , Berthold Koletzko  9 , Julia Birnbaum  9 , Yannis Manios  10 , Odysseas Androutsos  11 , Luis A Moreno  1 , E Leigh Gibson  12 ; ToyBox-study Group
Affiliations
Randomized Controlled Trial

Longitudinal associations between food parenting practices and dietary intake in preschool children: The ToyBox Study

Paloma Flores-Barrantes et al. Nutrition. 2024 Aug.

Abstract

Introduction: Food Parenting Practices (FPPs) include the practices parents use in the act of feeding their children, which may further influence their health.

Objectives: To assess associations between changes in FPPs (permissiveness, food availability, guided choices, water encouragement, rules and limits and the use of food as reward) over 1 year and dietary intake (water, energy-dense/nutrient-poor and nutrient-dense foods) at follow-up in 4- to 6-year-old preschool-aged children.

Methods: Longitudinal data from the control group of the ToyBox study, a cluster-randomized controlled intervention study, was used (NCT02116296). Multilevel ordinal logistic regression analyses including FPP as the independent variables and dietary intake as outcome.

Results: Nine hundred sixty-four parent-child dyads (50.5% boys and 95.0% mothers) were included. Limited changes on the use of FPPs were observed over time. Nevertheless, in boys, often having F&V at home was associated with higher F&V consumption (OR = 6.92 [1.58; 30.38]), and increasing home availability of F&V was directly associated with higher water consumption (OR = 7.62 [1.63; 35.62]). Also, not having sweets or salty snacks available at home was associated with lower consumption of desserts (OR = 4.34 [1.75; 10.75]). In girls, having F&V availability was associated with higher F&V consumption (OR = 6.72 [1.52; 29.70]) and lower salty snack consumption (OR = 3.26 [1.50; 7.10]) and never having soft drinks at home was associated with lower consumption of sweets (OR = 7.89 [6.32; 9.86]). Also, never being permissive about soft drink consumption was associated with lower soft drink consumption (OR = 4.09 [2.44; 6.85]).

Conclusion: Using favorable FPPs and avoiding the negative ones is prospectively associated with healthier dietary intake, especially of F&V, and less intake of soft drinks, desserts, and salty snacks.

Keywords: Energy-dense/nutrient-poor foods; European children; Food parenting practices; Longitudinal study; Nutrient-dense foods.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declaration of competing interest The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests: Paloma Flores-Barrantes reports financial support was provided by Government of Aragon Department of Education Culture and Sports. Pilar De Miguel-Etayo reports financial support was provided by Carlos III Health Institute.

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