Effects of restrictive and self-selected feeding on preschool children's food intake and waste at snacktime

Abstract

Regulating young children's food intake is common practice in child care facilities. Many caregivers fear that children will overeat or waste food if allowed to select their own portions. The purpose of this study was to compare food intake and waste of preschool children at snacktime when given one portion of snack and when allowed to self-select their snack amount. Subjects were 20 3-year-olds and 20 4-year-olds enrolled in a university preschool. For the 29 days of restrictive feeding, children were offered only one portion of snack. For the 25 days of self-selected feeding, children could eat as many portions as they wanted. Based on a 2 × 2 factorial analysis of variance (ANOVA), there was a significant interaction of class and feeding method. During self-selected feeding, the 4-year-old group increased their intake to a greater extent than the 3-year-old group. The number of portions wasted was not significantly different for the two feeding methods; however, the younger children wasted significantly more than the older children. These results indicate that preschool children in group settings will eat more than one portion at snack time when they are allowed to self-select their intake without significantly increasing the amount they waste.