Mothers influenced daughters' fruit and vegetable intake via their own patterns of fruit and vegetable intake and by influencing their daughters' tendencies to be picky eaters. Both picky and nonpicky eaters had aspects of their diets that did not meet recommendations. Taken together, these findings suggest that parents should focus less on "picky eating" behavior and more on modeling fruit and vegetable consumption for their children.

The authors examined whether pressuring preschoolers to eat would affect food intake and preferences, using a repeated-measures experimental design. In the experimental condition, children were pressured to eat by a request to finish their food. We collected intake data, heights and weights, child-feeding practices data, and children's comments about the food. Children consumed significantly more food when they were not pressured to eat and they made overwhelmingly fewer negative comments. Children who were pressured to eat at home had lower body mass index percentile scores and were less affected by the pressure in the lab setting than children who were not pressured at home. These data provide experimental evidence supporting previous correlational research indicating that pressure can have negative effects on children's affective responses to and intake of healthy foods.

These findings provide new longitudinal evidence that early intake of sweetened beverages predicts adiposity and weight status across childhood and adolescence.

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Objective-To characterize patterns of dairy intake among girls in middle childhood.Design-Longitudinal data were used to characterize girls' patterns of dairy intake at age 5, 7, 9, and 11 years.Subjects-Participants were 151 girls from predominately middle-class and exclusively nonHispanic white families living in central Pennsylvania.Statistical analyses-Intakes of dairy, energy, macronutrients, vitamin D, calcium, and phosphorus were assessed using three 24-hour dietary recalls in 151 non-Hispanic white girls at age 5, 7, 9, and 11 years. Analyses of changes over time were conducted using repeated measures analysis of variance. McNemar's χ 2 test was used to analyze change in percentage of dairy consumers over time.Results-From age 5 to 11 years, girls' total dairy intake remained stable. Total milk consumption declined, due to a decline in intake of milk as a beverage, while intakes of cheese and dairy desserts increased. Much of the decline in milk intake from age 5 to 11 years, especially for milk as a beverage, was due to a reduction in the percentage of girls consuming milk as a beverage, not simply due to a decline in the servings of milk as a beverage consumed by consumers. On average, girls met vitamin D recommendations over time; however, by age 9 and 11 years girls failed to meet calcium and phosphorus recommendations.Conclusions-Although girls' dairy intake was stable over time, at age 7, 9, and 11 years girls did not meet the recommended three servings per day, leading to suboptimal intakes of calcium and phosphorus at age 9 and 11 years. Increasing milk intake among all children should continue to be a major focus of interventions.Milk and other milk products make important contributions to children's diet quality by providing abundant amounts of protein, vitamins, and minerals. Dairy products are therefore nutrient-dense foods necessary to promote bone health, to help reduce risk for chronic diseases like osteoporosis, and to promote overall health (1,2). Dairy products are major sources of calcium and vitamin D and also an abundant food source of phosphorus, potassium, magnesium, riboflavin, niacin, vitamins B-12 and A, and protein in children's diet (1,3,4).Despite the recommendation that children consume two to three servings per day (5), dairy food intake by children, especially girls, falls well below this (6). between 1989-1991 and 1994-1996 (6,7). Although the decrease in milk consumption has occurred for both girls and boys, it may be more problematic for girls because they may be at greater risk for developing osteoporosis later in life (8). Nationally representative cross-sectional data indicate an increase in cheese intake from 1989-1991 to 1994-1996; however, this increase was not sufficient to compensate for the decrease in milk and total dairy consumption (6,9-11). Similar trends in national and regional data have been observed in other studies (12)(13)(14)(15)(16) and in an analysis of the US food supply (17). As result of decreased dairy product consumption, particularl...