P11 Evaluation of a Food and Children's Emotions (FACE) Picture Book and Tool for Improving Head Start Preschoolers’ Ability to Recognize Six Basic, Food-Related Emotions

Abstract

Background Emotions likely play a role in children's food choice. Before understanding the association between children's emotions, food preferences, and food choice, tools must be developed to measure and improve a child's ability to recognize emotions. Objective To evaluate a Food and Children's Emotions (FACE) picture book and tool to improve preschoolers’ ability to recognize six basic, food-related emotions: happy, sad, fear, mad, feeling nothing, and disgust. Study Design, Settings, Participants Researchers developed a FACE picture book and tool, which asks children to match facial expressions of emotions with corresponding labels. Fifty two four-to-five-year-old preschoolers (28 (53.8%) Black/African American and 24 (46.2%) Hispanic) from Head Start schools in North Carolina were randomly assigned to the control or intervention group. All children completed three assessment periods (T0, T1, and T2); each assessment occurred 7-14 days after the previous one. The picture book was read to the intervention group just prior to the T1 assessment. Measurable Outcome/Analysis Descriptive statistics, such as counts and percentages, were used to describe gender and ethnicity for the sample. Data were analyzed using Cochran's Q test and McNemar's test (P Results Cochran's Q test detected significant differences in children's ability to recognize fear, feeling nothing, and disgust across the three assessments in the intervention group, but not the control group. McNemar's test indicated that the intervention significantly improved children's ability to recognize those three emotions from T0 to T1 and from T0 to T2, and indicated high consistency in children's ability to recognize those emotions. At T0, preschoolers were fairly adept at recognizing happy, sad, and mad, and no significant differences were detected in their ability to recognize those emotions in either group between assessments. Conclusion This study provided evidence that the FACE picture book and tool are effective, valid, and reliable at measuring preschoolers’ ability to recognize six emotions and improving their ability to recognize fear, feeling nothing, and disgust. Funding None.