After lunch each girl was interviewed to make sure they were no longer hungry and left alone in an observation room with toys and large bowls of 10 highly desirable snacks, including chocolate bars and potato chips, for 10 minutes. Following the snack period, researchers measured how much each child consumed of each snack. The findings revealed that in the absence of hunger, nearly all the girls ate snacks, with consumption ranging from 0 to nearly 450 calories. Approximately one-third said that they would feel bad if their mother or father found out about what they had eaten. And, the more restricted a child felt, the more she tended to eat.
Structure plays an important role in the development of children's eating behavior.
Parents' restrictive feeding practices are associated with young girls' negative self-evaluation of eating. Check out our Consumer News section for more nutrition information . I recently began feeding him a little rice cereal at night to keep him full. Several controlled research studies have shown that babies really don't sleep longer as a result of being given cereal at bedtime. Although early cereal feeding is probably not harmful, there is good scientific data to support the American Association of Pediatrics' recommendation that no solid foods be given until about 6 months of age.