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theses

ETD graduate

Statement of Problem: Infant complementary feedings lay the foundation for lifelong habits and food preferences that promote wellness and prevent chronic disease. Yet few studies exist examining infant food preferences and acceptance. There are no dietary recommendations for infants, as most studies have focused on children over age 4. More studies are necessary to explore infant food acceptance to guide future recommendations to increase fruit and vegetable intake during the introductory period.

Objective: The objective was to examine the association between the sensory qualities of food and infant food acceptance or rejection during the food introductory period.

Methods: A pilot study using a survey questionnaire was designed to assess infant taste reactions to variables of color, smell, taste, temperature, and texture. The study included18 mother-infant dyads. Infants ranged from 6 to 12 months of age and mothers ranged from 17 to 36 years old. All mothers participated in the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children. Mothers indicated whether their infant was breast or formula-fed. Outcome measures used included mothers maintaining a neutral expression, infant facial expressions and number of spoonfuls eaten as indicators for infants’ response to novel food, as well as mothers’ and investigators’ rating of infant overall reaction to the food. Mothers also rated their infant’s preference due to food sensory variables. Any comments or reactions made by mothers which were associated with the feeding were recorded by the lead investigator and one of two research assistants. Descriptive statistics using means, standard deviations, and percentage were used to report infant anthropometric, demographic, and outcome measures. Kendall’s coefficient of concordance was also performed to determine inter rater agreement between mother and researchers’ ratings of the infant trial baby food.

Results: Mothers reported their babies had little preference for the color of food including green colored foods. Foods that smelled good were preferred by their babies and sometimes, but rarely, smells of food were disliked. Additionally, sweet tastes were preferred by infants over bitter tastes, with the majority rarely disliking bitter tastes. Infants preferred their food to be sometimes at room temperature or warm. Infants also favored smooth textures and disliked chunky textures. Most infants were rated by mothers and investigators as accepting and liking the novel food offered during data collection. Both mothers’ ratings of infant food acceptance and investigators’ ratings were similar. Method of infant feeding had no bearing on the outcome. Many mothers were surprised their infants ate the food and one mother’s personal food bias prematurely stopped the feeding session. Kendall’s W findings indicated that all three raters had near perfect agreement.

Conclusions: Formula-fed infants were as accepting as breastfed infants to a novel food. Most infants whose mothers maintained a neutral face accepted a novel green vegetable. Although the study did not test the idea that a mother can limit her infant’s exposure to vegetables due to her own food bias, it appears to support this view. Furthermore, this study supports prior work indicating that infant willingness to eat, and not infant facial expressions, should guide feedings because it may take several repeated offerings at meals for the infant’s facial expression to change.

ETD_11244

M.S.

Includes bibliographical references

doi:10.7282/t3-5mec-yx75

The author owns the copyright to this work.