Family meals promote healthy eating habits, increased well-being and improved academic outcomes among children and adolescents. Despite these benefits, families typically eat together less as children age and become busy with after school jobs and activities. To help families continue the tradition of family meals, our team with researchers at the University of Guelph and Loughborough University wanted to understand why families with young children eat together. By considering the variations in which families think about and approach family meals, we aimed to glean insight into strategies to help maintain family meals over time.

We interviewed 20 families with preschoolers aged 18 months to 5 years. Interviews explored how parents’ past experiences with family meals (in childhood and earlier in adulthood) influence their current beliefs and mealtime practices with their own children.

Families with preschoolers approached meals from one of three perspectives.

1) Family Meals for Togetherness: Parents described the focus of the family meal is to be together as a family. Social interaction during family meals was discussed as being more important than the food provided.

2) Family Meals for Nutrition Messaging: Parents discussed how family meals ensure their kids eat well and provide opportunities to educate about nutrition and portion sizes. For some, the desire for healthy meals was driven by concern towards what/how much their child should be eating. For others, it stemmed from challenges with body image and intergenerational body shame.

3) Family Meals as Necessity: Parents described family meals as very functional and a required part of parenting. Parents explained how meals serve as a time to accomplish the necessary goal of feeding their children.

The family’s approach to mealtimes was informed by parents’ own mealtime experiences and significant life transitions, like becoming parents. The messages parents shared with their children during mealtimes, and the challenges they experienced characterised the family’s approach to mealtimes.

A tailored approach to support family meals.

Effective family support may require health professionals to learn and respond to the family’s approach to mealtime. ‘Togetherness’ families can be encouraged to continue eating together for family bonding. Due to a strong intergenerational transmission of family meals, these families may not need support to continue eating together. ‘Nutrition Messaging’ families tended to describe mealtimes as a source of anxiety and frustration due to concerns about nutritional intake. These families may benefit from support to take a more relaxed approach to family meals, focusing more on the social benefits and less on nutrition. Families with a ‘necessity’ approach can be encouraged that family meals are an excellent way to create routines for their child, even as they get older and require less supervision while eating. These parents may require support to problem-solve strategies to make meals more manageable, like quick, easy recipes and reminders that any shared meal is beneficial– breakfast counts too!

Our results highlight the importance of acknowledging the powerful influences of both parents’ experiences with eating across the life course and intergenerational meal practices, on current meal routines when planning interventions and family support.

For more insights into the family meal orientations and implications for research and practice, access the paper for free until 7th October here.

Funding for this research was provided by the Canadian Foundation for Dietetic Practice and Research (CFDR).