User login
It’s a scene you’re all too familiar with – you’ve gone to a lot of trouble to give your children a well-prepared and nutritious meal, but a lot of it never leaves the plate. It’s frustrating, and you worry about their health, but according to the Cornell Food and Brand Lab, this is not unusual behavior.
When an adult serves him or herself food, it almost all gets eaten, according to a study from Brian Wansink, Ph.D., director of the Cornell Food and Brand Lab in Ithaca, N.Y., with the average adult eating 92% of the food served. However, the same study also found that children eat only about 60% of the food they serve to themselves, indicating a broad difference in how adults and children approach food.
Adults know what they like, and if they try something new, they might only take a little bit in case they don’t like it. Children tend not to fully understand their limits and may take a lot of something they’ve never had before because it looks appetizing, try it, realize they don’t like it, and not finish it. “It’s natural, for them to make some mistakes and take a food they don’t like or to serve too much,” Dr. Wansink said.
Dr. Wansink noted that the children in the study were not eating with their parents, and perhaps they would have eaten more if their parents had been there, but not enough to account for the vast discrepancy between the two groups. Other possible factors in children eating less include uncertainty toward how much will make them full, whether or not they are eating with utensils, the presence of friends, and whether they are introverted or extroverted.
So for all the frustrated parents out there“who want his/her noncooperating children to be vegetable-eating members of the clean plate club,” there is good news in these results. “They show that children who only eat half to two-thirds of the food they serve themselves aren’t being wasteful, belligerent, or disrespectful,” Dr. Wansink concluded. It’s a matter of kids just being kids.
It’s a scene you’re all too familiar with – you’ve gone to a lot of trouble to give your children a well-prepared and nutritious meal, but a lot of it never leaves the plate. It’s frustrating, and you worry about their health, but according to the Cornell Food and Brand Lab, this is not unusual behavior.
When an adult serves him or herself food, it almost all gets eaten, according to a study from Brian Wansink, Ph.D., director of the Cornell Food and Brand Lab in Ithaca, N.Y., with the average adult eating 92% of the food served. However, the same study also found that children eat only about 60% of the food they serve to themselves, indicating a broad difference in how adults and children approach food.
Adults know what they like, and if they try something new, they might only take a little bit in case they don’t like it. Children tend not to fully understand their limits and may take a lot of something they’ve never had before because it looks appetizing, try it, realize they don’t like it, and not finish it. “It’s natural, for them to make some mistakes and take a food they don’t like or to serve too much,” Dr. Wansink said.
Dr. Wansink noted that the children in the study were not eating with their parents, and perhaps they would have eaten more if their parents had been there, but not enough to account for the vast discrepancy between the two groups. Other possible factors in children eating less include uncertainty toward how much will make them full, whether or not they are eating with utensils, the presence of friends, and whether they are introverted or extroverted.
So for all the frustrated parents out there“who want his/her noncooperating children to be vegetable-eating members of the clean plate club,” there is good news in these results. “They show that children who only eat half to two-thirds of the food they serve themselves aren’t being wasteful, belligerent, or disrespectful,” Dr. Wansink concluded. It’s a matter of kids just being kids.
It’s a scene you’re all too familiar with – you’ve gone to a lot of trouble to give your children a well-prepared and nutritious meal, but a lot of it never leaves the plate. It’s frustrating, and you worry about their health, but according to the Cornell Food and Brand Lab, this is not unusual behavior.
When an adult serves him or herself food, it almost all gets eaten, according to a study from Brian Wansink, Ph.D., director of the Cornell Food and Brand Lab in Ithaca, N.Y., with the average adult eating 92% of the food served. However, the same study also found that children eat only about 60% of the food they serve to themselves, indicating a broad difference in how adults and children approach food.
Adults know what they like, and if they try something new, they might only take a little bit in case they don’t like it. Children tend not to fully understand their limits and may take a lot of something they’ve never had before because it looks appetizing, try it, realize they don’t like it, and not finish it. “It’s natural, for them to make some mistakes and take a food they don’t like or to serve too much,” Dr. Wansink said.
Dr. Wansink noted that the children in the study were not eating with their parents, and perhaps they would have eaten more if their parents had been there, but not enough to account for the vast discrepancy between the two groups. Other possible factors in children eating less include uncertainty toward how much will make them full, whether or not they are eating with utensils, the presence of friends, and whether they are introverted or extroverted.
So for all the frustrated parents out there“who want his/her noncooperating children to be vegetable-eating members of the clean plate club,” there is good news in these results. “They show that children who only eat half to two-thirds of the food they serve themselves aren’t being wasteful, belligerent, or disrespectful,” Dr. Wansink concluded. It’s a matter of kids just being kids.
