Giving Children a Voice: Exploring Preschool-age Children's Beliefs about Eating

Abstract

Childhood obesity is often attributed to behaviors related to eating. However, little is known regarding what preschool-age children believe about eating or methodological approaches best suited to elicit their beliefs. The purpose of this study is twofold: first, to explore preschool-age children's beliefs about eating with those children who are obese and those of healthy weight; second, to evaluate three methodological approaches (ethnographic interview, free list, and unconstrained card sort) used with this age group for data collection. Childhood obesity affects nearly 10% of preschool children placing them at risk for adverse health consequences. Obesity is often attributed to eating (a behavior) either large quantities and/or energy dense, non-nutritious foods. Behavior (eating) may be partly explained by personal beliefs. Exploring preschool-age children's beliefs about eating using ethnographic methods offers a unique approach to uncover cognitive representations that may underpin and motivate their eating behavior. This insight is critical since eating behaviors are established by preschool and being obese at that age is predictive of becoming obese as an adult. This study aims to: (1) describe similarities and differences in the beliefs of four to six year old Caucasian children who are obese and those of healthy weight about eating, and (2) examine the extent to which each methodological approach reveals preschool-age children's beliefs about eating by weight status. This descriptive study combines ethnography and narrative research to capture beliefs shared by those of similar weight status and language used by preschool-age children to talk about eating. Ethnographic interview, free list, and unconstrained card sort are triangulated to discover preschool-age children's beliefs about eating. A purposive sample to reach saturation or up to 30 obese and 30 healthy weight four to six year old Caucasian children are being recruited from a pediatric office in northwest Ohio. This study has been approved by the University of Michigan IRB. Data collection and analysis are in process. Aim 1. To describe similarities and differences in the beliefs of preschool-age children who are obese and those of healthy weight about eating, data will be analyzed by weight status. Interviews are being analyzed using Spradley's developmental research sequence. Data from free lists will be analyzed using Anthropac, a computer software program, to determine frequency, order, and salience of food items. Data from card sorts will be analyzed using Anthropac to determine relationships among children, food items, and attributes. Aim 2. To examine the extent to which each methodological approach reveals preschool-age children's beliefs about eating, results from analysis of each weight status group's data will be compared heuristically. Preliminary findings suggest that preschool-age children utilize multiple cognitive frameworks in constructing their beliefs about eating. Giving children a voice would create new possibilities in developing interventions to empower preschool-age children to eat healthy foods and assist parents with their child's eating behaviors. This study contributes to identifying an efficient methodology for collecting data with preschool-age children for future research.