Abstract
BackgroundChildren spend a substantial amount of time in early care and education (ECE) settings and may eat a majority of their diet in this setting. While there are several instruments focused on measuring factors of the ECE environment that may influence diet and weight outcomes, there are few comprehensive, valid, and reliable measures for collecting self-report of ECE providers’ feeding practices. The purpose of this study was to establish the factor structure and internal reliability of a survey developed to measure practices and beliefs of ECE providers relative to feeding children.MethodsLicensed ECE centers from CA, CO, ID and NV were included in this cross-sectional survey study. The sample was stratified by states and census regions to yield equal numbers of centers from each category. The total sample distribution included 1600 randomly selected centers and up to 8000 staff members (who represented teachers, aides, assistants, or cooks); 1178 surveys were completed. We conducted an exploratory, unrestricted factor analysis as well as parallel analyses to inform the number of factors to be extracted.ResultsFactors within Structural Mealtime Strategies included Adult Control of Foods Consumed (Kuder-Richardson [KR] = 0.67), Bribing with Sweet Foods (KR = 0.70), and Supportive Adult Roles at Mealtime (KR = 0.55). Factors in Verbal Mealtime Strategies included Supporting Children’s Eating Self-regulation (KR =0.61), Pressure to Eat (KR = 0.58), and Social Comparisons (KR = 0.59). Beliefs about Mealtime factors were Autonomy Promoting (α = 0.64), Coercive Beliefs (α = 0.77), and Concern-Based Control (α = 0.60).ConclusionsThe AFC Strategies and Beliefs Survey provides a promising self-report instrument with a strong factor structure consistent with the extant literature to measure practices and beliefs related to feeding and mealtimes in the ECE setting. Feeding young children in group settings differs in many ways from feeding in a family setting; hence it is important that measures such as the AFC Strategies and Beliefs Survey capture unique aspects of the ECE feeding environment.
Highlights
Children spend a substantial amount of time in early care and education (ECE) settings and may eat a majority of their diet in this setting
Endorsement percentages indicated that eight Mealtime Structure items reflected floor (n = 3) and ceiling effects (n = 5); these items were not included in further analyses
In summary, 14 items were included for exploratory factor analysis (EFA) analyses within structural mealtime strategies; 13 items were included for verbal mealtime
Summary
Children spend a substantial amount of time in early care and education (ECE) settings and may eat a majority of their diet in this setting. Given that children may spend long hours in Early Care and Education (ECE) settings, they may consume up to 2/3 of their daily nutrient intake [2] while away from home These experiences may influence lifelong eating, which in turn can impact health, including weight status [3]. Best Practice is a term used across health care, business, government, industry, and in our case ECE, to denote “a procedure that has been shown by research and experience to produce optimal results and that is established or proposed as a standard suitable for widespread adoption” [5] If followed, these guiding documents are proposed to support increased quality of care in the ECE setting. It becomes increasingly important to understand the mealtime environments and feeding strategies ECE providers use to instill healthy eating behaviors in young children using these guidance documents as a framework
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