Improving children’s vegetable intake at mealtimes

This event is part of a series of Psychology seminars that regularly occurs during the Autumn and Spring terms.

Young children in the UK commonly do not meet national dietary recommendations, such as to eat five portions of fruits and vegetables per-day. Strategies including repeated exposure, use of rewards, and environmental changes are proposed to increase vegetable consumption, yet these techniques often lack ecological validity and practicality at mealtimes.

In this seminar, Liam Chawner will address the problems with children’s diets and highlight key areas of children’s diets that can be targeted to increase vegetable intake. Liam will present studies demonstrating what makes an acceptable meal, how parental beliefs may affect parenting practices, and what we can do to improve intakes through the use of intervention in schools. Together, these findings illustrate the need for interventions and strategies that can be assimilated into everyday habits to improve dietary variety and vegetable intake in children.