Wellness Wednesday

When It Comes To Getting Your Child To Eat Healthy, Don't Give Up!

Recent research from the University of Buffalo has found that many parents give up on trying to get their children to eat healthy after the first attempt. However, they have also found that a parent continues to attempt feeding their child the same food, they will eventually begin to like it.

Getting kids to eat a variety of foods is sometimes harder than getting cow down a flight of steps. It often seems like continually trying to feed your child something you know that they won't like isn't worth the screaming match that it turns into. Researchers at the University of Buffalo, have recently concluded that varied diets and persistence in exposing infants and children to healthy foods are key to healthy eating behaviors. The researchers based their study off of 40 peer reviewed studies on how infants and young children developed preferences for healthy food. They found that the base for healthy eating starts during pregnancy, by exposing the fetus to a variety of foods, especially healthy ones.

It is almost just as important to get a child exposed to a variety of foods as an infant as it is in the womb as well. The researchers looked at a study in which infants were exposed to red peppers or squash. While almost all of the infants rejected them at first, all of them ended up eating the food after the fifth or sixth exposure. The study also found that rewarding the children for eating healthy foods might have some poor effects down the line, as good behavior that is later not rewarded in the same way will be challenged.