Father Involvement in Feeding Interactions with Their Young Children.

A growing body of literature highlights the important role and influence that fathers can have in shaping eating and physical activity patterns of their children. Paternal practices and parenting styles have been shown to be associated with highly controlling feeding practices and overweight status in children.1,2 Alternatively, encouragement and modeling of healthy behaviors by fathers has been associated with a lower BMI among their adolescent daughters.3 Fathers’ use of fast food restaurants also has been associated with school-aged children’s use of fast food restaurants.4 There is overwhelming evidence that parents play a critical role in shaping early dietary and sedentary and physical activity patterns in their young children5–10 through their own behaviors, role-modeling, parenting styles, and feeding practices.11–13 Much of this knowledge, however, has been learned by largely studying mothers and their young children. There is a need for more research on fathers as previous studies involving fathers and children have grouped multiple child age groups together such as preschoolers, school-aged children, and adolescents; moreover, studies too often are limited by the small and non-representative samples of fathers in the United States (US). Determining the extent of involvement and influence that fathers have in their young children’s feeding and sedentary and physical activity patterns is important because early childhood represents a key developmental window to shape healthy behaviors into late childhood and adulthood.14–17 Furthermore, the high and increasing prevalence of overweight and obesity among US men, currently estimated at 60% and 30% respectively,18 makes this knowledge crucial as overweight and obese men place their young children at increased risk for unhealthy weight outcomes through a genetic susceptibility and exposure to obesity-promoting behaviors and environments.3,19,20 In addition, furthering the knowledge on the relationships between fathers and their young children can provide critical information about an often overlooked group of care-givers and offer new strategies to promote healthy weight in children. To that end, the focus of this study was to (1) use a nationally representative sample of US households to describe paternal involvement in the following eating and physical activity practices with their young children: preparation of food with child; playing outside with child; eating out with child; assisting child to eat; eating breakfast or dinner with child; and perceived influence over child’s nutrition; and (2) examine the relationship of these paternal practices with child intake of fruits, vegetables, sweetened beverages, and fast food; child patterns of daily physical activity and television viewing; and the frequency of family meals.