Mealtime behaviors of young children: A comparison of normative and clinical data

The objective of this study was to compare the behavior of healthy young ch ildren around feeding and mealtimes to the behavior of two clinical groups, children referred for feeding problems without related medical issues and those with medical issues associated with the feeding problems. Using the B ehavioral Pediatrics Feeding Assessment Scale, data were obtained for 96 he althy children between the ages of 9 months and 7 years, and descriptive in formation is presented in the paper on these normal mealtime behaviors. In comparing this normative data to similar data obtained from the clinical gr oups, our primary purpose was to investigate whether children with feeding problems engage in fundamentally different behaviors (maladaptive) or simil ar behaviors, but at an increased frequency to normal children. Factor anal ysis identified five common patterns of behavior across the three groups. T he difference in parental report of feeding difficulties between healthy an d clinical groups appears to reflect the frequency in which the child with feeding difficulties engages in the problematic behavior, rather than funda mental differences in behaviors exhibited during mealtimes.