Parents are to blame if child is a fussy eater – but not for the reason you think

Parents often berate themselves for raising a fussy child but a study has found that disdain for certain foods is genetic.

Three-quarters of a child’s hatred for certain foods can be blamed on the genes they inherit from their parents, a UCL study reveals, with environmental and social factors responsible for other picky eating tendencies.

A long-running study on 2,400 pairs of twins gathered information from parents about their food preferences as the two children grew up.

Genetics accounted for 60 per cent of fussiness at 16 months old, the scientists found, rising to 74 per cent between ages three and 13.

Food fussiness often lends itself to selectivity for certain textures or tastes and a reluctance to branch out into different cuisines.

“Food fussiness is common among children and can be a major source of anxiety for parents and caregivers, who often blame themselves for this behaviour or are blamed by others,” said study lead author Dr Zeynep Nas from UCL.

“We hope our finding that fussy eating is largely innate may help to alleviate parental blame. This behaviour is not a result of parenting.

“Our study also shows that fussy eating is not necessarily just a ‘phase’, but may follow a persistent trajectory.”

Genes play a big role in picky eating

The study looked at how picky pairs of twins were at dinnertime and analysed the variation between them. They then compared fraternal twins to identical twins to see if the eating patterns were different.

They found that identical twins were much more likely to not eat the same foods than fraternal twins.

Identical twins, which come from one fertilised egg, share 100 per cent of the same DNA but non-identical pairs, which come from two eggs, have 50 per cent of the same DNA, just like normal siblings.

This indicates that genes play a big role in picky eating, the study authors state. However, as children grow up their eating patterns change and twins become more unique, data shows.

Scientists suggest that this shows that environmental factors become more influential than genetics in dictating what foods people eat and like as they grow up.

“Although fussy eating has a strong genetic component and can extend beyond early childhood, this doesn’t mean it is fixed,” said Dr Alison Fildes, study senior author, from the University of Leeds.

“Parents can continue to support their children to eat a wide variety of foods throughout childhood and into adolescence, but peers and friends might become a more important influence on children’s diets as they reach their teens.”

The paper is published in the Journal of Child Psychology & Psychiatry.