Temperament and Feeding Styles in Offspring of Women with Eating Disorders (2013)

Undergraduate: Anne Altschul

Faculty Advisor: Cynthia Bulik
Department: Nutrition

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History of an eating disorder can affect both the parenting style of mothers and the behavioral development of their children. This investigation included 25 mothers with history of an eating disorder and 25 control mothers. Both groups had children 6-36 months in age. We compared laisez-faire, pressuring, restrictive, responsive, and indulgent feeding styles between the mothers using the Infant Feeding Styles Questionnaire (IFSQ). Second, we compared the temperament of the children on surgency, negative affect, and effortful control as measured by the Infant Behavior Questionnaire (IBQ) and the Early Childhood Behavior Questionnaire (ECBQ). Lastly, we determined whether differences existed in the manner in which maternal feeding style and child temperament were associated. Mothers with histories of eating disorders had significantly lower mean scores for restrictive feeding style (2.7, sd=0.5) than control mothers (3.0, sd=0.5) (p≤0.04). No significant differences in mean child temperament scores were observed. A positive association between pressuring feeding style and child surgency was observed in mothers with histories of eating disorders (0.32) whereas the association was negative in control women (-0.06) (p<0.05). Although the mechanism for this association is unclear, these findings suggest that mothers with histories of eating disorders may be more likely to resort to pressuring feeding styles with high-energy children than unaffected mothers.