Unlocking opportunities in food design for infants, children, and the elderly: Understanding milestones in chewing and swallowing across the lifespan for new innovations

Abstract

The human feeding, chewing, and swallowing mechanism adapts and changes over the life span. There are opportunities to influence flavor development from as early as life in utero, and through milk feeds. Infants also need exposure to soft lumps to develop rudimentary chewing skills that lay the foundation for mature chewing. Melt-in-the-mouth textures and familiar flavors can help children to bridge to new food and diminish development of picky eating. Similar textures can also be used for the elderly particularly if used with food flavors and compounds that excite the trigeminal system to promote increased food variety. Adults taking medication with dry mouth side effects benefit from moist foods. Special populations, such as those with swallowing difficulties, may benefit from use of micro encapsulated compounds that trigger the trigeminal pathway. Introduction of a food texture labeling system is advocated.

The Factors Influencing Meal Satisfaction in Older Adults: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis

“…Considering general characteristics as a factor, meal satisfaction levels were found to decrease with increasing age. This finding was consistent with the findings of the study by Cichero [30] that emphasized food texture. People's ability to feel food texture is known to decrease with age.…”

Complementary foods in baby food pouches: position statement from the Nutrition Commission of the German Society for Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine (DGKJ, e.V.)

“…The complementary feeding period is not only important for the provision of nutrients but it also serves as a time of transition from an exclusive milk diet to a diet of diversified family foods, with gradual learning of differentiated oropharyngeal movements and the development and shaping of eating behaviors [7, 8]. When infants receive complementary foods primarily through sucking foods from baby food pouches, this may delay or hinder learning to eat from a spoon or learning to eat finger foods [9]. The exploration of foods with the lips, tongue, and the hands as well as the practice of chewing can be impaired.…”

Dynamic Oral Texture Properties of Selected Indigenous Complementary Porridges Used in African Communities

“…When starch is heated in water, it swells, gelatinizes, and pastes to form a thick gruel [8,9,10]. Infants and young children have difficulty to consume and swallow a viscous porridge due to their limited oromotor capacity [32]. The thickness or viscosity of shear-thinning foods is perceived by mechanoreceptors in the mouth, and oral thickness perception depends on the in-mouth shear stress applied and the resultant shear rate [33].…”