The effect of parental intuitive eating behaviour on picky eating of preschool and school age children

Picky eating is a common nutritional problem during childhood. Parents' attitudes and behaviours to food may influence children's eating habits. This cross-sectional descriptive study aimed to evaluate how parents' intuitive eating level affects picky eating behaviour in preschool and school-age children, with a sample of 143 parents who had children aged 4-11 years. General Knowledge Questionnaire, Eating Attitudes Test-26 (EAT-26), Intuitive Eating Scale-2 (IES-2), Child Feeding Questionnaire (CFQ), Parental Feeding Style Questionnaire (PFSQ) and Children's Eating Behavior Questionnaire (CEBQ) were administered to the parents participating in the study. When the responsible person for nutrition is the mother (n=134), the distribution of the child BMI classification according to the maternal BMI classification is statistically significant (p=0.002). The rate of underweight children with underweight mother, significantly higher than obese mother. The rate of obese children with obese mothers is significantly higher than in normal mothers. The total score of the IES-2 and the Eating for Physical Rather Than Emotional Reasons score was significantly higher in mothers with normal BMI than in obese mothers. There was a low correlation between the Body-Food Choice Congruence subscale and CEBQ-Fussiness (p<0.01). There is a low negative correlation between emotional feeding and eating for physical rather than emotional reasons and the IES-2 total score (p<0.01). IES-2 Total Score values of parents of normal weight children were significantly higher than those of parents of underweight children (p<0.05). The distribution of PSFQ scores according to weight according to height and BMI Z score classification according to age was not statistically significant (p<0.05). Parents should be educated about the consequences of their behaviours, such as restricting or encouraging eating, as their attitudes towards their children's nutrition can influence their eating behaviours and food preferences.