Elsevier

Appetite

Volume 34, Issue 1, February 2000, Pages 61-76
Appetite

Regular Article
Effectiveness of teacher modeling to encourage food acceptance in preschool children,☆☆

https://doi.org/10.1006/appe.1999.0286Get rights and content

Abstract

Although Social Cognitive Theory (Bandura, 1997) suggests that teacher modeling would be one of the most effective methods to encourage food acceptance by preschool children, opinions of experienced teachers have not yet been sampled, teacher modeling has rarely been examined experimentally, and it has produced inconsistent results. The present study considers opinions of teachers and conditions under which teacher modeling is effective.

Study 1 was a questionnaire in which preschool teachers (N=58) were found to rate modeling as the most effective of five teacher actions to encourage children's food acceptance.

Study 2 and Study 3 were quasi-experiments that found silent teacher modeling ineffective to encourage either familiar food acceptance (N=34; 18 boys, 16 girls) or new food acceptance (N=23; 13 boys, 10 girls). Children's new food acceptance was greatest in the first meal and then rapidly dropped, suggesting a “novelty response” rather than the expected neophobia. No gender differences were found in response to silent teacher modeling.

Study 4 was a repeated-measures quasi-experiment that found enthusiastic teacher modeling (“Mmm! I love mangos!”) could maintain new food acceptance across five meals, again with no gender differences in response to teacher modeling (N=26; 12 boys, 14 girls).

Study 5 found that with the addition of a competing peer model, however, even enthusiastic teacher modeling was no longer effective to encourage new food acceptance and gender differences appeared, with girls more responsive to the peer model (N=14; 6 boys, 8 girls). Thus, to encourage children's new food acceptance, present results suggest that teachers provide enthusiastic modeling rather than silent modeling, apply such enthusiastic modeling during the first five meals before children's “novelty response” to new foods drops, and avoid placing competing peer models at the same table with picky eaters, especially girls.

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      A small number of these studies addressed the potential conflict between institutional eating practices and those in the family home (Derscheid et al., 2010; McSweeney et al., 2016; Swindle & Rutledge, 2020), but overall, the studies in this section focus on what happens in the educational setting. The importance of role-modeling–in which teachers eat with, and ideally eat the same foods as, the children–was highlighted in a large number of studies in this area (Erinosho et al., 2012; Fallon et al., 2018; Hendy & Raudenbush, 2000; Lehto, Ray, Vepsäläinen, et al., 2019; Lindsay, Salkeld, Greaney, & Sands, 2015; Ray, Määttä, Lehto, Roos, & Roos, 2016; Sisson et al., 2017; Wallace, Lombardi, De Backer, Costello, & Devine, 2020). For the most part, teachers report that they sit with the children and value the importance of sharing meals for encouraging healthy eating behaviors and creating a positive meal environment (see also Section 3.2.1.3).

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    The present research was supported by Research Development Grants, Faculty Research Grants, Small Grants, and the Research Assistant Program of Penn State University. Participant recruitment was assisted by Barbara Demko, Mary Ann Devlin, Eileen Farber, Dorothy Franks, Marie Karavage, Karen Koppenhaver, Lynn Measel, and Jean Yanosky of Schuylkill Child Development, PA. Research assistants included Susan Bamford, Jill Cook, Helen Frehafer, Wendy Gehrig, Jake Girardot, Margaret Greco, Shannon Haley, Rebecca Hill, Tesha Honse, Janice Johnston, Melanie Lehman, Anne Mercuri, Ethel Miller, Sheree Minnich, Jennifer Moyer, Dorothy Myers, Kenji Nozaki, Karen Rauenzahn, Karen Smith, Raquel Snyder, Jennifer Thomas, Krista Yeager and Michelle Zubris. Special thanks are given to the parents, teachers, and children who made the studies possible.

    ☆☆

    Address correspondence to: H.M. Hendy, Ph.D., Department of Psychology, Penn State University, Capital College, 200 University Drive, Schuylkill Haven, PA 17972 U.S.A.

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