Using cognitive mapping to understand Senegalese infant and young child feeding decisions

Abstract

Caregivers make decisions about how to feed their infants and young children based on complex interactions of knowledge, beliefs, and values, as well as assessments of situational determinants, including economic and social constraints and opportunities. Because of the relationship of these factors to the adoption of new feeding behaviours, the development of nutrition interventions for this age group must be grounded in knowledge about the target population. This paper presents the results of a study that used cognitive mapping techniques to gain insight into mothers' knowledge and perceptions of foods for infants and young children and examine their significance for feeding decisions in Saint-Louis, northern Senegal. Guided by mixed-methods protocols from the Focused Ethnographic Study for Infant and Young Child Feeding Manual, in-depth interviews that included qualitative discussions and cognitive mapping techniques were conducted with 46 mothers in rural and peri-urban communities. We explored mothers' perceptions about five dimensions that affect food decision-making-healthiness, convenience, child acceptance, appeal, and modernity-and the relationship of these dimensions to 38 local food items. Data analysis entailed a combination of qualitative thematic analysis and descriptive statistics. In both communities, "healthiness" was the most valued dimension for food decision-making by a large margin, followed by child acceptance, appeal, modernity, and convenience. We explore how different interpretations and definitions of these dimensions, and their relationship to specific local food items, may influence the design and planning of nutrition interventions. The results support the importance of mixed-methods formative research to illuminate the emic perspectives of caregivers.

Naturally Fermented Milk From Northern Senegal: Bacterial Community Composition and Probiotic Enrichment With Lactobacillus rhamnosus

“…In many regions of Senegal, naturally fermented milk is known as lait caillé and forms an integral component of the daily diet. Recent ethnographic studies have documented the role of lait caillé in the complementary feeding diets of infants and young children in northern Senegal ( Zobrist et al, 2017 , 2018 ). The microbial community in milk drives the fermentation process and is of great importance for the shelf life, safety, nutritional, and organoleptic properties of the final product.…”

As a mother, I prefer to give a healthy snack, however... : Mothers’ considerations and value conflicts while providing snacks to their 2-7-year-old children

“…The most frequently mentioned consideration of mothers to provide a snack to their young child was health. Likewise, previous studies identified health as an important food related value (Connors et al, 2001) and as driver of food choice by mothers (Walsh et al, 2015;Zobrist et al, 2018;Damen et al, 2019a). Child preference was another important motive for mothers to provide a snack.…”

“…Moreover, the study of Machín et al (2016) among low-income mothers of children aged 1-5 years revealed that mothers gave more importance to the healthiness of the food when selecting the foods for their children than for the adults living in their household. Johnson et al (2011), Walsh et al (2015), and Zobrist et al (2018) also identified health as an important diver for mothers' food choice.…”

“…Lusk and Briggeman (2009) added safety as another important food choice related value. Other studies also indicated health as an important consideration in the food choice of consumers (Grunert, 2006;Connors et al, 2001;Cunha et al, 2018) as well as a driver in food choice by mothers for their children (Walsh et al, 2015;Machín et al, 2016;Zobrist, 2018). the child's preference, which could be compared with the consideration taste in the model of Furst et al (1996), is another important driver in food choice according to many studies.…”

“…Universal considerations in snack providing seem to exist among mothers; all mothers, irrespective of the country they live in, mentioned healthiness and preference of the child as important considerations (Chapter 6). Likewise, several studies revealed that health affected mothers' food choice of mothers from, for example, Canada (Walsh et al, 2015), the USA (Johnson et al, 2011), Uruguay (Machín et al, 2016), Senegal (Zobrist et al, 2018) and the UK (Carnell et al, 2011). Moreover, mothers from the USA (Evans et al, 2011;Meers et al, 2016;Colón-Ramos et al, 2017), Indonesia (Rachmi et al, 2018), Australia (Russel et al, 2015Boak et al, 2016) and the UK (Carnell et al, 2011) reported child preference to be important in food choice for their children.…”