Repeated exposure to vegetables at day care centres to increase children*s vegetable acceptance

Children*s vegetable consumption is below the recommendations in many
countries. Dutch children aged 2-3 years eat approximately 40 gram of vegetable
per day, whereas 50-100 gram is recommended for this age group. Identifying
strategies to increase children*s vegetable consumption is an important goal
for chronic disease prevention. Because eating habits are developed early in
life and tend to track into adulthood, it is important to start in young
children with the development of healthy eating habits.

To investigate the effect of repeated exposure to different (novel) vegetable
tastes in day care settings on children*s vegetable acceptance

A pre and post-test design will be used with two parallel groups. Both the
experimental (N=100) and control group (N=100) will participate in a pre- and
post-measurement, in which ad libitum intake of the four target vegetables is
assessed (for each vegetable, at least two measurements per child). After the
pre-measurement, the experimental group will participate in a 5-month period
during which they are repeatedly exposed to four (novel) vegetable tastes (each
taste 13 times). One vegetable is offered each day during a specific vegetable
eating moment (social & educational moment) where the day care employees also
taste the vegetable. During the vegetable eating moments, the children are
allowed to eat as much or as little as they want. The control group will keep
their regular routine.

An intervention of 5 months in which children are repeatedly exposed (13x) to
four different vegetable tastes, of which 3 are novel/ unfamiliar and 1 is
relatively familiar (See also study design).

This study is group-related: participation of the children in the day care
setting is essential, because they are the subjects of interest: can we
encourage children*s vegetable acceptance via the day care setting? Research
results from adult studies cannot be extrapolated to children, therefore, the
day care centre children need to be included to make proper conclusions about
effects in this age group and in this setting. Without participation of the
children, the study is useless for the final aim of promoting vegetable intake
in young children.
The risk for participation is nil, since the products are made with
commercially available fresh products, consisting of ingredients that are
widely available in super markets and are not harmful for children. The
products are made with utmost care according to all safety and hygienic
regulations.
The burden can be considered as low. The children receive the vegetables within
their daily eating routine at the day care. The eating moment will be made as
pleasant as possible for the children by making this moment educational, social
and fun. They will never be forced to eat the vegetable.
The study is non-therapeutic, but the children can benefit from it. First of
all, children are exposed to new vegetables in an attractive way together with
their peers in a familiar and safe environment. Because children are often very
curious, they may appreciate this taste journey. Moreover, when the children
experience the different vegetable tastes, this may help them to broaden their
liked vegetable repertoire, and they may eat a larger variety of vegetables
with more pleasure (and less resistance), making vegetable eating more
enjoyable for themselves and their parents (less vegetable stress). In the end,
we expect that this helps them to increase their vegetable consumption and to
encourage vegetable variety in their diet for the rest of their life, which may
be beneficial for their health, a great benefit.
We expect that - due to the intervention - parents may become more aware of
their child*s vegetable eating behaviour and successes (tastings) at the day
care centre may stimulate the parent to offer the family other vegetable
varieties, and in this way broaden the vegetable repertoire of the whole
family. It may also inspire the parents to use other serving methods for the
vegetables.