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Taking the Battle Out of Getting Kids to Eat Healthier and Move More: Child &...
Chapter 1 of 9 · Fundamentals
Parenting styles
Introduction and Parenting Styles Overview
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Educational content from recorded physician discussions — not medical advice. Talk to your (or your child's) care team about your situation.
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What the experts said
Weight is not a behavior; weight loss is not something a child can go home and do. Providers should focus on healthy habits instead.
All children need a healthy habit goal regardless of whether they are underweight, average size, overweight, or obese.
Authoritarian parents (controlling, strict) may hand-feed their child to control intake long after it is developmentally appropriate or restrict food intake.
Indulgent parents (permissive) may use food as comfort or reward to control behavior, with the child in control much of the time.
Uninvolved parents are neglectful, with children responsible for choosing their own food and deciding how much to eat even at a young age.
Authoritative parenting (responsive, with structure and limits) is the ideal style where children learn to self-regulate food intake, self-feed, enjoy mealtime, and enjoy being active.
Using words like 'play' or 'be active' is more motivating to children than 'exercise' or 'workout,' which sound like work.
Parents should not dictate intake or neatness; it is developmentally appropriate for young children to make a mess while eating.
When parents force, pressure, restrict, or forbid foods, they override the child's internal hunger and fullness cues.
When parents indulge or bribe with food, it teaches the child they can get their favorite food by whining or crying.
Children should not go more than 4 hours without eating to maintain normalized hunger and fullness cues.
Breastfeeding is the first introduction to the family table; breastfed babies get used to different flavor profiles from what the mother eats, which helps prevent picky eating tendencies later.
Formula-fed babies have the same flavor profile repeatedly, which may contribute to picky eating later.
Parents should read baby cues accurately; crying can mean many things (wet diaper, discomfort), not just hunger. Automatically feeding in response to crying can lead to inappropriate soothing with food.
When a toddler starts throwing food on the floor, that is a cue that mealtime is over.
It is harder to establish rules and limits around eating when children are older (teens) than when they are very young.
The 60 minutes of daily physical activity for children can be broken up throughout the day (e.g., 20 minutes before school, 20 minutes after school, 20 minutes after dinner).
Moderate to vigorous activity means the body is working: increased heart rate, sweating, muscle fatigue, and shortness of breath are normal signs that the body is working.
When parents praise children for finishing all their food, it overrides the child's hunger and fullness cues and sets them up to want to finish all meals to get praise again.
Parents should praise children for listening to their tummy and knowing when they are full, not for cleaning their plate.
Using food as a reward (e.g., 'if you are good, we can get ice cream') teaches children that good behavior is contingent on food rewards.
Food should not be part of a reward system; good behavior should be an expectation with or without rewards.
Taking away physical activity as discipline is counterproductive; being active could be what helps a misbehaving child get their behavior back in order, especially after sitting all day at school.
When parents use physical activity as punishment (e.g., 'run 3 laps around the house'), children associate physical activity with something to avoid and will not be motivated to participate.
Brain breaks (short periods of physical activity) before homework help children refocus their brains and can make them more efficient with homework.
Encouraging children to take breaks while working on homework can make them more efficient, not less, by helping them refocus.
There is not enough chips to fill a child up; snacks lacking protein will not satisfy hunger and lead to grazing behavior.
Protein is a crucial component in snacks to help keep a child feeling full until the next meal.
Research shows it can take 10, 15, or more times of offering a previously refused food before a child will try it.
The AAP recommends no screen time for infants and children under 2 years old.
The AAP recommends no more than 2 hours of screen time daily for children 2 years and older.
Toddlers need at least 30 minutes of structured physical activity daily and at least 60 minutes (up to several hours) of unstructured physical activity.
Toddlers should not be sedentary for more than 60 minutes at a time except when sleeping.
School-age children need to be active 60 minutes a day, with most activity being aerobic at moderate to vigorous intensity, plus muscle and bone strengthening activities.