Elsevier

Appetite

Volume 105, 1 October 2016, Pages 144-150
Appetite

Social cognitions about food choice in children aged five to eight years: Feasibility and predictive validity of an age appropriate measurement

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.appet.2016.05.023Get rights and content

Abstract

There are currently no instruments available to measure social cognitions towards food choice in children. This study aimed to test the feasibility and predictive validity of a novel measurement tool to assess food-related social cognitions.

Sixty-eight children, five to eight years old, were asked to sort cards with photographs of four fruit and four sweet/savoury snacks as a mean to measure attitudes, subjective norms, perceived behavioural control (PBC), and intention. Subsequently, food choice (dependent variable) was assessed using a laboratory food choice task in which children could gain access to sweet and savoury or fruit items, or a combination.

All participants completed the tasks successfully, demonstrating feasibility of the procedure. The order in which the cards were sorted for each construct differed sufficiently and correlations between constructs were in line with previous studies. Measures of PBC, intention, attitude, and subjective norm from the mother, but not from teachers or friends, correlated significantly with subsequent food choice.

It is possible to measure food-related social cognitions in children aged five to eight and these measures were predictive of observed behaviour. The new instrument can contribute to our understanding of psychological determinants of food choice in young children.

Section snippets

Participants and procedure

A total of 68 children (63.2% girls) aged five to eight years participated in this study.1 The sample was recruited from a nursery and an out-of-hours children’s club in the north of Portugal. In order to include normal weight, overweight and obese children, participants were also recruited from a paediatric obesity department, in a central hospital in

Results

The sample comprised 52.9% non-obese and 47.1% obese children. The average BMI-percentile was 84.41 (SD = 22.30). 63.2% were girls and the average age was 6.43 years (SD = 0.89), ranging from five to eight years. Engagement in the tasks was coded by the trained researcher on a scale from 0 to 100%. This scale was based on child reported understanding of the tasks, as well as on the completion of the procedure. The researcher recorded in all cases that the children were fully able to understand

Discussion

The present study aimed to test the feasibility and predictive validity of a novel assessment to measure food-related social cognitions in young children. To date, social cognitions have been assessed through self-reports on Likert scales and that procedure excluded children younger than eight years old from studies investigating personal cognitions about feed choices (e.g. Bazillier et al., 2011). The present study showed that a measurement procedure based on sorting cards representing the

Author contribution

VAS, SFM, FFS conceived and designed the work. SFM collected the data. PG and SFM analysed the data. VAS, SFM, FFS, PG and SG contributed to the interpretation of the data. SFM, VAS and PG drafted the article. All authors critically reviewed the article and approved of the final version to be submitted.

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank the Dr. Henedina Antunes for her support in recruiting participants, as well as the schools, parents and children for participating in this study. Thanks to Dr. Bronia Arnott and Susanna Mills for helpful comments on an earlier version of this paper proofreading. Falko Sniehotta is funded by Fuse (grant number is MR/K02325X/1), the Centre for Translational Research in Public Health, a UKCRC Public Health Research Centre of Excellence. Funding for Fuse from the British

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