Diet, Nutrition, and Oral Health: What Influences Mother’s Decisions on What to Feed Their Young Children?

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to learn about mothers’ experiences with food choices for their pre-school children in underprivileged communities in Greater Western Sydney (GWS). A total of 20 mother-child dyads living in GWS were recruited to a qualitative study from an ongoing birth cohort study. Participants’ houses were visited for semi-structured interviews, which were recorded, transcribed verbatim, and analysed thematically. The interviews yielded five main themes: (i) food choices, nutrition, and health; (ii) accessibility and availability of foods (iii) buying time for parents; (iv) child’s age and their preference on food choices; (v) conditioning certain behaviours by family and cultural factors. Nutrition literacy, child’s preferences, unhealthy food intake by family members, child’s demand, advertising and availability of harmful foods, and time constraints were all mentioned as hurdles to mothers making appropriate meal choices for their children. However, some identified facilitators were promoting parents’ knowledge, increasing access to health educational materials, upskilling mothers to providing healthier alternatives, regulating the marketing of unhealth foods. Although, the present study identified critical factors that influence mothers’ food choices for their young children, making healthy food choices is a complex practice as it is shaped by individual, social and environmental influences.

The differential predictive utility of two caregiver-targeted self-efficacy measures to promote oral health of underserved children.

“…First, many studies have limited their assessment of oral health to tooth brushing behaviors. Tooth brushing is an important oral health behavior, yet additional oral health behaviors (e.g., diet, dental utilization) have shown to contribute to overall oral health and well-being (Arora et al, 2021). Oral health self-efficacy may have differing relations, effect strength, or both with a variety of oral health behaviors (e.g., tooth brushing, flossing; Smith et al, 2020) which likely has important implications when attempting to simultaneously target multiple oral health behaviors.…”

Fewer Children in Families Associated with Lower Odds of Early Childhood Caries: A Sample from Three Countries

“…At the child level, dietary sugars are metabolized by oral cariogenic bacteria to create acid which demineralizes the teeth, particularly with frequent and prolonged sugar exposure and inadequate toothbrushing habits [23][24][25]. Early childhood diet and oral health are shaped by many family factors as well as social and commercial determinants of health, including education and socioeconomic conditions, and marketing and access to healthy versus caries-causing foods and beverages, oral hygiene products, and dental care [26][27][28][29].…”

Influence of maternal and child factors on the dental service utilization among preschool children in Bangalore urban district: a cross-sectional study

“…1 As children learn and adopt health behaviours from their parents. 2,3 more time in routine caregiving activities with their children and are most often the primary source of physical comfort and safety for the child. 5 Mothers' health behaviour is mostly influenced by their knowledge, literacy, beliefs, culture and background.…”

“…5 Mothers' health behaviour is mostly influenced by their knowledge, literacy, beliefs, culture and background. 3 Their oral health knowledge, behaviour, and perceptions are necessary for preventing dental diseases in children, while dental fear can avoid visits to the dentist and ignore routine dental check-ups for their children. 6 Dental caries is considered the primary marker of children's oral health, whereas dental visits as a marker of care.…”