Household Chaos, Maternal Emotional Responsiveness, and Child Eating Behavior: A Moderation Analysis.
Jaclyn A Saltzman, Kelly K Bost, Brent A McBride and 1 others
PMID 31318779WHAT IT FOUND
Noisy, disorganized homes were linked to more food-seeking and emotional overeating in toddlers, but only when mothers were less sensitive at mealtimes.
Sensitivity alone was not linked to eating behavior.
Key findings
01Household chaos was associated with food responsiveness and emotional overeating, while observed and self-reported maternal responsiveness were not significantly associated with child eating behaviors.
02Observed maternal sensitivity at mealtimes moderated the chaos-food responsiveness association: higher chaos was linked to higher food responsiveness only when observed sensitivity was lower, not when sensitivity was higher.
03The same moderation pattern appeared for emotional overeating, but the effect was smaller and only reached p = 0.05, so it needs cautious interpretation.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they found
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What it does not show
The study is cross-sectional, so it cannot show that household chaos or low maternal sensitivity caused the eating behaviors. The sample was small and mostly White, married, middle income, well educated, and employed, so it may not apply to more diverse or higher-risk families. Families reported less household chaos than in published reports, so the findings may not extend to homes with more chaos. Only mothers were observed, so fathers and other caregivers were not considered. Child eating behavior was parent-reported, and no validated observational eating measure for children under 3 was available. Mealtime coding stopped at 20 minutes, which may have biased families with longer mealtimes. The emotional overeating moderation effect was smaller and only reached p = 0.05, so it needs cautious interpretation.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that reducing household chaos or training maternal mealtime sensitivity will improve toddler eating behavior. This was a cross-sectional study, and the associations were only significant for food responsiveness and emotional overeating among families with lower observed maternal sensitivity.