J Nutr Educ Behav

Objective To understand the association between parenting and children’s dietary fat consumption, this study tested a comprehensive model of parenting that included: parent household rules, parent modeling of rules, parent mediated behaviors, and parent support. Design Cross-sectional. Setting Baseline data from the MOVE/me Muevo project, a recreation site-based obesity prevention and control intervention trial. Participants Five hundred and forty-one parents of children between the ages of five and eight years old and living in San Diego County. Main Outcome Measure(s) Children’s fat consumption based on parent-report of a short food frequency questionnaire. Analysis A hierarchical linear regression was conducted. In exploratory analyses, a step-wise backward elimination approach was used. Results Children’s fat consumption was positively associated with parent household rules (P<.01), and negatively associated with parent modeling of rules (P<.01). Conclusions and Implications Controlling parenting behaviors such as rule setting is associated with more frequent fat consumption, whereas role modeling healthy behaviors is associated with less frequent fat consumption. Changing parenting behaviors with regards to how they feed their children are logical avenues for improving eating behaviors. (177)

22591580

PMC3383891

Journal Article

CDC Public Access