Early food refusal: Infant and family characteristics

This study compared infants who developed food refusal during the first year of life with a healthy control group concerning feeding, growth pattern, family situation, and infant behavioral characteristics. Infants with food refusal had a lower relative weight at inclusion in the study and at follow-up at the age of 2 years. Food refusal was also associated with weaning problems, parental reports of lower food consumption, a higher incidence of breast-feeding, a higher frequency of meals, psychosocial problems in the family, less positive perceptions of parenting, infant difficultness, and problematic behaviors. The findings have implications for identification and understanding of factors related to early food refusal.