Mealtime behaviors associated with consumption of unfamiliar foods by young children with autism spectrum disorder

Parent and child mealtime behaviors associated with consumption of unfamiliar foods by children with ASD were examined. Families of 38 children aged 2 through 8 years old and diagnosed with ASD videotaped a typical home mealtime during which parents presented the child with an unfamiliar food and mealtime behaviors were subsequently coded through an observational coding system. The child taking sips of their drink was the only behavior related to whether the child took a bite of the unfamiliar food throughout the course of the meal. Parent direct commands and parents feeding the child were related to greater frequency of subsequent bites in a close temporal window, while child play, the child being away from the table, and child talk about things other than food related to lower frequencies of subsequent bites. Clinical interventions for food selectivity in children with ASD might provide parents education on effective mealtime parenting strategies and decreasing inappropriate child mealtime behaviors.