Eating habits of a mother during pregnancy can predict whether she will give birth to a fussy eater or not.
According to the researchers from Monell Centre in Philadelphia, babies learn food habits while in their mother's womb and display similar kind of food habits after birth. So mothers who don't eat lots of vegetables and fruits during pregnancy and lactation are more likely to have babies who will exhibit a dislike towards them and become fussy eaters.
Researchers say that it is necessary to expose children to all kinds of food from the time they are in their mother's womb to avoid this problem.
"In the environment we evolved in, both sugars and salts were scarce. Sweet is a signal for energy, the predominant taste of mother's milk, [and] salt is meat and minerals," Dr. Julie Mennella of the Monell Chemical Senses Centre in Philadelphia, told Telegraph. "Babies are already biologically hardwired to be attracted to foods containing sugar and salt, but they have to be exposed to fruit and vegetables if they are to learn to accept and like these flavours."
Researchers base their results on two studies. The first study looked at 46 babies, aged between six months and one year. It included mothers, who were particular in drinking carrot juice during their last stages of pregnancy and those who didn't take the juice in their pregnancy. Babies of the mothers who took carrot juice during their last stages of pregnancy and lactation period, were found to love eating carrot-flavored cereal compared to the babies of mothers from the other group.
In another study, researchers found regular exposure to all kinds of food early makes babies eat a wider variety of food. For the study, investigators instructed mothers to feed their weaning babies green beans for eight days.
They found by the final day, babies developing a liking for the vegetable (80g) and consuming more quantity of the vegetable compared to the first day (50g).
"Regardless of if a child is breast or bottle-fed, it can still learn as soon as it starts to wean. If they are repeatedly exposed to fruit and vegetables, they soon begin to accept these foods," Dr Mennella, explained to Daily Mail. "By age two, there is no reason a child should not have the same varied diet as an adult."
Findings of the studies were presented at the annual meeting of the American Academy for the Advancement of Science in Boston, Thursday.
